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Dispatch from the Dominican Republic: Arrived Safely
Our group has arrived safely in the Dominican Republic! Group leader Sarah Kelly wrote in an email earlier today: Thank you all for being early this morning! It took us over an hour to get checked in and through security, so we arrived to the gate as they started boarding! Remember to check...
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Nicaragua: The Journey Home
Dispatch from Nicaragua: “We are leaving our hostel at 8:00 am today for the airport, flying to Panama City and then from Panama City to Washington, D.C. And then hopefully at MFS by 5:00 am tomorrow morning.”...
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The History of Nicaragua
A history of Nicaragua — notes from a lecture by Aynn Setright Nicaragua is divided into three regions, the Miskito coast in the Caribbean named for indigenous people who live there, the central region and the Pacific coast. 1503 — Christopher Columbus came to Nicaragua and the Conquistadores came down from Mexico in search...
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Nicaragua: A Visit to Los Quinchos
Thursday, March 31st Today we woke up to our last wonderful breakfast at the hostel. We were quite reluctant to leave the friendly staff and footpath to the lookout tower, which provided many of us a safe haven for reflection and self discovery. We climbed into the bus for a 5-hour drive through the...
Continue readingBike Tour and Alcatraz!
All good things have to come to an end! Unfortunately that time has come on our San Franciso trip. Sadly we also had to say goodbye to our driver, Calvin, and our beloved tour guide, Lance! His wisdom and knowledge will surely be missed! Friday we started with a two-and-a-half hour bike tour of...
Continue readingWrapping Up a Busy Week With Studies of East Asia
We are going out again on the fifth day! The first place to go will be the University of Pennsylvania East Asian Civilization Dept. We listened to three speakers talk about Chinese poems, Study of Japan, and Asian Buddhism. After that, we went to a Japanese Tea House, which has authentic Japanese style architecture,...
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Exploring Art: Final Day — Bringing It All Together
After lunch, we finally got to set up our ceramic totem poles on the MFS grounds. The poles consist of cylinders, pinch pots and other shapes stacked on top of one another. Each person made at least 3 pieces for the totem poles. Each piece was decorated individually to represent the individual and the...
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Exploring Art: Putting the final touches on our projects
Today we stayed on campus to complete all of our projects both individual and group — photography, sculpture, mandalas and totems abound! It was a great way to end our week of exploration and creation. The photos say it all …...
Continue readingOur Last Day of Improv with Issues
Today we worked with our techniques on the issues of gender diversity and body image. Below are some parting thoughts about the week from our group members: “I enjoyed the spectrum activity as it sparked vital conversations about the MFS community.” “It was interesting how we could all understand the same concepts even though...
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GYLI: Rock Climbing & Final Reflection
Today was a long day for us at GYLI. We left MFS and went to Elite Climbing for the day. After we had a quick training, everyone was scrambling up the various climbing wall. Although the rock climbing is really challenging because most of us have never tried this, and we were all really...
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Making Tamales
On Friday we made tamales in the MacColl room. We had to gather ingredients and prepare the food. The filling of masa flour and green chile went in a cornhusk. Another type of tamale was chicken. This kind used chicken and a red chili sauce as the filling. Once prepared, the food was served....
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The Hoedown Sewdown
Today was our last day of sewing 🙁 We started our day off with a couple hours of finish-up work, followed by an educational video about where all of our clothes will be going! After a quick snack and a couple more hours of work, we were treated to a super special Healthy Garden...
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Málaga: A Tasty and Picturesque Finish to a Beautiful Trip
Today we went to the Ave Marie School in Málaga. We were shown around the school and saw the kindergarten and the fourth grade students. Our choir members sayng Siyahamba for the fourth grade students. After that we were shown the electronics teacher and the car shop teacher. We were explained how these work in Spain...
Continue readingAsian Culture: The Middle East
Yesterday, we visited the University of Pennsylvania’s campus to learn about the history of Iraq and Iran and their historical relationship. We had a lecture from two graduates of the school. The first was a man who spoke about stereotypes of Middle Eastern countries vs. stereotypes about the United States. He also had...
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