Hello all:
I finished my week in Newburyport, MA and now I'm in Hamilton, MA. Our cast manager left for week, and just before he left, he enlightened us with some wisdom. "It is easy to be great when we have what we need. The real challenge is being great when we don't have what we need. Cast B 2012 has been great, whether we have what we need or not." I applied this to our tour around the world, and there have been and will be times when we don't/won't have what we think we need. It takes courage, teamwork, strength and open-mindedness to be great when we don't have everything. We are here to be great wherever and with whatever we have.
This week, we were working in classrooms in elementary schools, middle schools, and high schools. The coolest part? We were in 83 classrooms, and reached over 2000 students. We did activities such as creating a personal flag with the elementary students, a values auction with the high schoolers, and a cultural trivia game with the middle schoolers. We talked about what values meant to different people, and why we value different things. At first, the high schoolers were reluctant to get into the workshop, but after we did a few rounds of bidding on things like "a long happy life" or "to find the cure for a disease", there were discussions floating around the room that surprised me. These students were talking about the importance of having a long healthy life, and if you have that, everything else can fall into place because being happy rubs off on everyone else, and happiness can spark people to do great things. Some of these kids were only freshmen! It was a great way to start our classroom work.
We have two shows this week, and it's estimated that 1200 people are going to show up at both shows. Incredible, isn't it? And I can't believe it's already September. I'm starting my third month! and in three months, I'll be home for Christmas! Man, time flies!
I will see you all soon, and until then, hasta luego!
Bonnie
Thursday, September 6, 2012
Saturday, September 1, 2012
Good afternoon, friends:
I apologize for the lack of updates lately. When I get back to my host family's house, it's all I can do to stay awake during dinner. I will also apologize in advance, especially because these next few weeks are going to be incredibly busy, preparing the cast for ouf first international travel day: a 17 hour flight to Taiwan! So, bear with me!
These past few weeks have been incredible. Last week, the cast was on Cape Cod. What a beautiful place! We performed in a venue that seated 1400 people, and each night was sold out! Awesome, isn't it? While on the cape, we did a variety of community service projects. The cast helped clean and tidy the local YMCA, helped with maintenance for a local farming group, and visited elderly people. The best part of the cape was not the community service work. The best part was whale watching! On one of our host family days, a group of us spent the day in Provincetown and enjoyed part of the morning and afternoon watching Humpback whales splash around off the coast of Cape Cod. It was a wonderful experience! I am so grateful to have had that awesome bonding time with some of the cast members as well!
This week, we've been in Newburyport, Massachusetts. It's a beautiful, small colonial town, about the size of Durango. The first day of community service, I was in a group that worked at a church building a natural play ground for preschoolers with special needs. We made a sand box surrounded by large rocks, we built a teepee from vines and sticks and various other things. We made a wheel type thing in the ground and a small art studio to display the artwork they create. It was such a pleasure to see the joy on the supervisors face. She said it would have taken them months to accomplish what we accomplished in one day! I felt so honored. She also attended the show and said she had never seen something so powerful. It was a great week for the cast. I am so proud of the effort we all put in, and it's incredible to see what we got out of it.
These next weeks will be insane. We are doing anti-bullying workshops every day next week, along with 5 shows! Once again, I'm sorry for the lack of posts.
Hope everyone is enjoying the last few days of summer!
Love and hugs,
Bonnie
I apologize for the lack of updates lately. When I get back to my host family's house, it's all I can do to stay awake during dinner. I will also apologize in advance, especially because these next few weeks are going to be incredibly busy, preparing the cast for ouf first international travel day: a 17 hour flight to Taiwan! So, bear with me!
These past few weeks have been incredible. Last week, the cast was on Cape Cod. What a beautiful place! We performed in a venue that seated 1400 people, and each night was sold out! Awesome, isn't it? While on the cape, we did a variety of community service projects. The cast helped clean and tidy the local YMCA, helped with maintenance for a local farming group, and visited elderly people. The best part of the cape was not the community service work. The best part was whale watching! On one of our host family days, a group of us spent the day in Provincetown and enjoyed part of the morning and afternoon watching Humpback whales splash around off the coast of Cape Cod. It was a wonderful experience! I am so grateful to have had that awesome bonding time with some of the cast members as well!
This week, we've been in Newburyport, Massachusetts. It's a beautiful, small colonial town, about the size of Durango. The first day of community service, I was in a group that worked at a church building a natural play ground for preschoolers with special needs. We made a sand box surrounded by large rocks, we built a teepee from vines and sticks and various other things. We made a wheel type thing in the ground and a small art studio to display the artwork they create. It was such a pleasure to see the joy on the supervisors face. She said it would have taken them months to accomplish what we accomplished in one day! I felt so honored. She also attended the show and said she had never seen something so powerful. It was a great week for the cast. I am so proud of the effort we all put in, and it's incredible to see what we got out of it.
These next weeks will be insane. We are doing anti-bullying workshops every day next week, along with 5 shows! Once again, I'm sorry for the lack of posts.
Hope everyone is enjoying the last few days of summer!
Love and hugs,
Bonnie
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