Based out of the western suburbs of Chicago, i-appreciate.org was formed as a non-profit organization to make a difference in the world. i-appreciate.org intends to bring the topic of domestic violence to public consciousness through activeness in the community and the selling of specifically designed anti-domestic violence t-shirts. All the proceeds from the sale of our shirts are used towards numerous services for women and children affected by domestic violence. It is our sincere hope that everyone will wear the shirts with pride and abide by what the shirts represent. These shirts are an affirmation of tolerance and respect towards one another. It is not our only goal to raise money and awareness for survivors of domestic violence, but it is our sincere hope that this organization will start a social movement.

Living united means respecting one another. Living united means loving one another. We live united through appreciating one another. We truly hope that you all will join our mission to make a statement that resonates throughout the world. No matter your religion, gender, or socio-economic class, we ask that you help i-appreciate.org stand up for what is right and against what is wrong.

To learn more, please visit our website: http://www.i-appreciate.org, our Twitter: http://twitter.com/iappreciateorg, our Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/iappreciateorg, or our Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/iappreciateorg.

We would love to explain more of what we’re about, please contact our Media Outreach Coordinator Mary at mary@i-appreciate.org or 313-300-5946. Or, feel free to contact me at muhi@i-appreciate.org, or our President/CEO, Altamash Iftikhar, at altamash@i-appreciate.org

Thank you very much for listening about our cause.

Sincerely Yours,
Abdullateef Muhiuddin (Muhi)
President of Marketing & Research
i-appreciate.org

I graduated from the University of Michigan-Dearborn and am ready to take on the world. Bring it!

I am going to volunteer on Martin Luther King Day, you should too! This is how I live united.

United Way of America is looking for the next LIVE UNITED story. Winners will be featured in next year's national ad campaign. From their site:

How do you LIVE UNITED? Grab the closest camera and make a short video explaining how you’re working to improve the education, income and health of people right where you live. Submit your video to the LIVE UNITED Story Search and you could be featured in United Way’s national ad campaign in 2010.

Here’s how:

• Record your story in no more than 2 minutes of video.
• Upload the video between now and September 30.
• Get your friends to vote for your story.

Don’t know how to make a video? It’s easier than you think! You can use a camcorder, a cell phone, a digital camera, a computer or anything else that records video. Stories will be judged on substance, not production quality, so don’t sweat the details.

We walked as a group to the Henry Ford Estate on March 6 2009 and we all gathered around the waterfall. The nature awakened me as I took a nap on those rocks with all of you. All of the memories I collected became alive in the back of my mind. Something inside of me unleashed and I felt the connection to all of you. This past week changed my life again as it did to all of you. It gave me hope, love, and family. I felt like I was born again to another year of my life. The energy I felt within nature, within all of us wrote a new start.
Every one of you…every memory…every smile and every tear is forever embedded in my life and in my future to guide me with my journey. I will carry all of you with me because you became the current that my stream follows. I want to thank all of you for being so great and giving the experience of my life.

With all my gratitude, love, and smiles
This is Amal- hand motion ( aka. Buck)

The mist of a falling
Spring
Tinkle my skin
As the breeze hugs
My limps on the forgotten
Rocks. Memories
Fly with each
Sound. Strangers
Conquer my existence
Standing around me
Stitching the same love
Love for all
To give
To serve
To live
Exhaling moments
Of forever
The sun stares at us
Reflecting rays of hope
From the eyes of tomorrow
A bond
Persists in its
Cycle
No stop
Keep breathing
Keep loving
Keep giving
Keep living

Breath.

Almost a Month after ASB and I feel empty as ASB's flashes keep reminding me of what I was during that week. I want to do more everytime. ASB taught me how to push myself to the max and how to face my fears along the way. I never expected my self to get so strong and hopeful.

Life is wonderful. After ASB-Detroit 2008, I felt anger toward people. I used to ask my self: why people don't care? Slowly, I realized that they simply don't know how.

To create change, I learned to see the light in everything dark. you have to have faith in this change for it to occur.

I love the energy I see now.I pray that my energy never weakens and I have the time to always serve my community and give my hand.

Service and ASB taught me how to love with no boundries and how love exists everywhere.

Magic unleached!
Amal: Team Magic, ASB Detroit 09'

Last Friday United Way for Southeastern Michigan (UWSEM) hosted yet another successful Alternative Spring Break. Here, college students came from all over to participate in a week of service projects in Detroit in lieu of other Spring Break plans. Nick, our program leader, and I had the pleasure of presenting 2-1-1 On the Go! to the students on their last day. It was a groggy bunch, them having been up slumber partying well into the morning, but they managed to respond to our mission with excitement (thanks to a little inspiration from UWSEM's Volunteer Coordinator, Kira Putt's cheerleading demonstration, and Nick's and my impeccable sense of humor).

Nick and I, as well as few other UWSEM staff members, led the students in going out into different communities in the Greater Detroit area, to find employers interested in hiring our clients. We sent teams to Dearborn, Midtown, Ferndale, and Hamtramck to scour the local businesses (avoiding national chains, with the exception of fast food restaurants) talking to employers about the needs of our clients. The teams went out equipped with an understanding of 2-1-1 and 2-1-1 On the Go!, and how to pitch the ask to employers for full-time jobs.

They must've done something right because we ended the day with 51 employers interested in varying degrees in helping out in some way with our mission. Not all of those employers will have jobs to offer, but at least they are willing to learn about our program and keep us in their back pocket if jobs do open up. Hopefully some will take to the mission and spread the word to other employers in their networks.

Nick has organized all the contacts into one spreadsheet (a task I avoid at all costs), and we will begin following up with the employers on Monday. We hope to get some jobs out of this, but more important is the experience that the ASBers were able to gain in being a unique voice for our clients. Hopefully they learned that you don't have to be on staff with 2-1-1 On the Go! to be a vital part of our ongoing mission, and they will continue to work on reeling in employers for us as they go about their lives.

This was a fun bunch to work with, and I am privileged to have met some pretty rad folks willing to give their time and energy for the betterment of people's lives.

Well I'm back in Oregon now...and all day I've been in a weird fog. I have never had such a hard time coming back from an ASB experience. I truly feel as though I formed a new family with 50+ people from around the country, and I'm sad to have to leave all of you! For most of you, I will most likely never see you again. But I would do it all again in a heartbeat.

For one week we came together in service and lived united. I feel so blessed to have served with all of you, to have learned from each and every one of you, and been filled with a piece of each of your passions for bettering our communities.

I return to work tomorrow to put my replenished passion to good use, mobilizing volunteers in my own community.

There is no doubt in my mind that we changed the world in a week. Not only did we touch the lives of individuals and agencies in Detroit, but we fueled the passions of 50+ young leaders from across our country. Young leaders that will return to their homes, and will inspire and mobilize others to Live United.

Five years ago I participated in my first ASB experience, and it literally changed my life. While a career in the non-profit world might not be for all of you, I know that you will all return to be a more active citizen because of the week you just experienced.

The only way the week you just experienced could fail is if you don't allow the energy of ASB 313 to ripple forward. Tell your friends, tell your family, tell complete strangers about how you Live United, let the amazingness that just occurred in Detroit echo through out our country.

Thank you for letting me Live United with all of you! You have truly touched my life.

Dear United Way, ASB Detroit 2009, Team Magic, and all of the participants:

You have changed me.

I said this two years ago when I returned from a dismal flight back into Pittsburgh from ASB 07, and I will say it again: You have showed me once more what a small group of people can do, what beauty there lies in the ruin.

And you have left me forever changed.

But something this time feels different. Maybe I was too young then. Maybe the reality of graduating in less that two semesters, job hunting, and choosing the right graduate school was not as near as it is for me now; but regardless of what it is, it is with me full throttle tonight.

You have, United Way, made me question how I want to spend my life for the second time. You have me now looking into Americorps, internships in nonprofit, and volunteer opportunities in the Detroit area for this upcoming summer. I have always wanted to write. I wrote books when I was eight, poems when I was twelve. "Deciding" on a major was never an issue for me; I wanted to write, and that's what I would do. And then I embarked on my journey to Lake Charles, Louisiana in March of 2007 and it changed my outlook on life. I returned back to my university and became a social work major for about thirty six hours. But it didn't take me long to decide against it; I was too soft to perform in a field like that; volunteering was something I could do on the side like I always had.

And then I came to Detroit.

On my index card that first night I wrote my three impressions of Metro Detroit: cars, poverty, and wasteland. I was uneducated about the city and a first timer in the entire Michigan area, and though I was embarrassed of my three words on the card, they were the three honest impressions that I had. I knew for the purpose of the exercise my views would change somewhat by the end of day seven, but I had no idea I would be where I am tonight. To tell my story of my week in Detroit now is a feat I don't think I can climb. As I sat in my seat in the airplane departing from Michigan and as I sit here in my dorm room in Pennsylvania tonight, I feel a strange and surreal vertigo that makes me question if this is an ending or a beginning for me, or if that sense of time in our lives matters either way.

What is hitting me now is how crucial the Alternative Spring Break program is for the metro Detroit area. Although the ASB programs are lumped collectively together as a month long endeavor that brings college-aged students from across the country to create real change in a community, Detroit, I realized midweek, was very, very different.

This city has been struck by no hurricane, damaged by no winds or inundated by no flood waters in a humid season that threatens yearly. The city of Detroit is plagued every single day by the winds of unemployment, wounded by the effects of urban sprawl and illiteracy, soaked through to the bone with a cold feeling of tiredness and poverty. There are no seasons for this kind of disaster. There are no government-induced groups of volunteers flooding the city limits to provide shelter and food and clean clothes to those in need. The people of Detroit carry on quietly, tirelessly, working twelve hour days at jobs they may not have tomorrow. They hold some of the highest unemployment rates in the country and are plagued most with child illiteracy and appalling high school drop-out numbers, and they need our help.

The kind of disaster that is happening to them is the disaster of humankind, of the failing economy, of the automobile industry's closing doors. It collects and it pools, it lingers, lies stagnant in the streets and blows rancid through the neighborhoods. And while those groups in the Gulf Coast and Indiana are needed dearly, the city and the people of Detroit cannot be forgotten.

Together, ASB Detroit unveiled visible changes to a community. Because of us, Franklin and Wright Settlements now has an up-and-running computer lab and library for the neighborhood kids and for adults who need to create resumes and look for jobs. Lighthouse Path now has painted apartments ready for new women to move in and start new lives. Because of us, two men, Chris and Jason, will now be able to leave their homes on wooden ramps and smell spring. We worked tirelessly and enthusiastically and changed people's lives, and together, we can bring that city back.

And how scary it is to think that I almost didn't come.

All of my friends were embarking on a spring training trip to Oak Ridge, Tennessee to row and practice for upcoming regattas. I had the option to go and spend the week with my closest friends, boyfriend, and teammates. I was tempted and playfully teased every day by them, and I almost stayed. But there was something that nudged me to embark on another adventure of the unknown. And just as Lauren Hooghuis chose to stay with sixty strangers when a friend of hers passed away that first night in Detroit, I chose blindly, too, to spend the week with you.

It has been an experience like no other. I asked this in my last blog after ASB 07 and I will ask it again: How do you sum up the greatest experience of your life? How do I respond when professors, friends, and relatives ask how my trip to Detroit went? Sure, I can tell them I stayed at the University of Michigan at Dearborn, toured the city, visited museums, met new people, and created a library and literacy lab for the community. But how can I ever explain the middle school dance party we had, the late nights in the UC, the cartwheels and laps around the track I did with friends? How can I give Jeannette's love and passion for the city of Detroit justice, describe the beautiful buildings, the time I almost got trapped on the People Mover?

How can I explain that I didn't just meet new friends, I bonded with people from places I have never visited with different backgrounds and lifestyles that yet all seemed so similar to me? Someone tell me how I will ever explain Katherine Haddad? How can I do that? I am overwhelmed when asked that question: How was your time in Detroit, because they will never understand Katherine's humor or Ashim's dance moves or Amal's kindness. They will never understand Muhi and Jason, or Dave and Sineal, or those kids' faces at Franklin and Wright when we unveiled their new computer lab. And I have to ask myself this: How could I have felt so home with these people even though I was five hundred miles away from it?

And that is what amazes me the most about these trips - you guys - the people I met, the team I was blessed with. Seven days ago I thought I was coming down to southeastern Michigan because I didn't think there were enough people who cared about volunteering in the area, and as I leave seven days later I have to thank every one of you for disproving that completely distorted image I carried with me. It is a beautiful thing to have been changed like I have, to now see the city of Detroit in a completely new light, and I have you all to thank for that. Now, when I think of the city, when I think of Michigan, I'll see Jeanette pointing and explaining buildings or theaters along the city streets after they have already passed, speaking a mile a minute enthusiastically and passionately about the city she taught me to love. I'll see Dave and Sineal working with their whole hearts at Franklin and Wright to give the people of that poor community a place to come together. I'll see Jon and Ursuala and Kira, and I'll see you kids, united in a way I did not think was possible.

And as I sit here on my dorm room bed on a rainy Pennsylvania night, I cannot help but to be both grateful and utterly and terribly sad. When the plane lifted into the skies of Michigan yesterday afternoon, I realized how scared I was to go back to the life I lived just one week before. I didn't know how I was going to return to my best friends, my own family after a week like the one we just had. It is times like those when the quickness of flying is unfair. In only one hour, I had gone from a cold and rainy Michigan as an Alternative Spring Breaker with a Katherine Haddad always at my side, to a seventy-five degree Washington D.C., alone. I was dressed in pants, warm shoes, hoodie, carrying in my hand a winter coat. The transition was visible, short, and cruel, and I was vaulted all-too quickly into a world where I didn't have to wear a lanyard and a nametag, where I was not surrounded by sixty incredible, motivating young people I had grown to love.

"I wish we could go to the movies," Katherine had said Thursday night. "I wish you could stay. We could do normal stuff together." I thought of us then on my ride back to my car in a silent taxi, what additional jokes we would share, what we would do when we were bored on Saturday nights. It is both a beautiful and unsympathetic glimpse ASB gives its participants: a look into a life and friendships in another place they had before been unaware of.

And when the taxi dropped me off and I had paid my fare, I climbed into my car and spent my trip north mulling over the week, reflecting on all I had learned, missing all that I had left behind. And out there, right now, I knew that there were college students flying into airports or driving into cities that would carry them into another ASB. Maybe they are scared, maybe they are nervous. It is bittersweet to think to know that while our experience has ended, another is just beginning. In another state, in another world from Detroit, there are rows of Nalgene bottles aligned on tables, fresh sweatshirts in boxes that - in one week - will, too, be painted and dirty and loved. So here's to them, here's to us, for living united, for changing the world.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

When we reached the falls behind U of M Dearborn, we took our share of pictures and each claimed a spot on the rocks. The balmy sixty-five degree Michigan air was a pleasant gift after a week of bitter cold, and the chance to rest during that late afternoon on Friday was an incredible feeling. I settled on a spot near the water and soon drifted into sleep. During the greatest and most satisfying nap I think I have ever taken, I dreamt of a group of nameless, faceless people that somehow fulfilled me, made me happy, made me smile and feel like home. And when I awoke on the warm rocks beside the rushing creek, they were there, all of you, gathered on the rocks alone or in groups, dozing or sitting in a comfortable silence with one another. And it may have been the greatest feeling of the week - at least for me - to just see everyone together nearing the end of a phenomenal experience, united in more ways that we could even begin to understand.

And I will hold that moment always, just as I will hold you all and that week we shared in southeastern Michigan. But for right now, I have to let you go, Detroit. I have a life to get back into, friends and family that need me to be the person that they hugged goodbye eight days ago. I have Anthropology to read and a Climate midterm to study for and an internship to find for this summer, and so I will place you carefully aside and strive to avert my eyes from the Motor City. It is unfair and it will be difficult, but I know all too well there is nothing I can do. And let me remind you again that you have changed me. You have reminded me that lasting friendships can come from the most serendipitous occasions, that young people can evoke long-term change. You have shown me a clearer view of what I want this life of mine to be. I have primer on my arm and black paint in my hair, fruit leather wrappings scattered all over my bed and a black hoodie on I do not have the heart yet to remove. I am tired and feeling like I am missing something, homesick for a place I didn't know could feel like home, but it is time now to move on.

And so I will ask again what I asked two years ago: How do you sum up the greatest experience of your life? I don't think you can. How do you return to reality after a week like the one we just had? You just do. You take the free t-shirts and the fruit leathers, the stubborn paint stains and the sore limbs with you. You take the memories and the laughs, the inside jokes and the pinky promises to send packages and to call and to visit and you take them with you. It's all you can do. You continue to do the work we all came together to do in the first place last Saturday: live united. Thank you United Way, ASB Detroit 2009, Team Magic, and all the participants. You have changed me.

Well friends, we did it!

Another successful year of ASB at Detroit. I'm going to do everything I can to make sure this event comes back to Detroit. If there is anything I can do to help United Way of SEM, let me know!

I titled this piece ASB Coma because, for a whole week, each and every volunteer, was in a trance. We all wanted to help, we all wanted to connect with others, we all wanted to reach out. We accomplished all of that and more.

Muhi
Team 2: Boom Roasted.

I've been dying to write blogs but for some reason, it wouldn't let me. :( Today is the second to last day and I'm really sad. I wish this week was longer. I feel like I just came here yesterday. Today was AWESOME. I loved dancing the Cupid Shuffle in Downtown, Detroit. After returning to campus, a bunch of us went to the Henry Ford Estate and just sat around the River Rouge. It was very peaceful and lots of people fell asleep on the rocks. I wish I can do that but I can't. I can't wait to do this again next year. I wish I can explain this week in more detail but I'm not used to blogging. I will put up a bunch of pictures and videos on facebook. It's almost time for dinner....

I cannot believe this is our last day here. I feel like I've spent a lifetime with these people. It, all in all, has been an amazingly rewarding experience, and I have met so many amazing people. It is so great to go somewhere and be surrounded by like-minded people in terms of wanting to give back to the community.

While I'm exhausted and falling asleep at random times, I am so not ready to leave. This is definitely something I could see myself doing for the rest of my life. Not building ramps (because I would go through all too many drill bits) but definitely being involved with non-profits and being out in the community, grassroots level.

There is nothing better than to say that I have helped someone gain his independence by building a ramp allowing him to get out and do some things on his own. I remember when I was a senior in high school, 4 years ago, getting foot surgery and not being able to do anything on my own. Being constantly dependent on other people to do everything for me was the worst feeling I have ever felt. Being able to do things for myself and be independent once I healed was amazing. I cannot imagine how it felt for Jason, being in a wheelchair for a much longer period of time than my healing when I had my foot surgery. To be able to get out and do things for himself will be great for him. For myself to be able to be a part of this has been a fantastic experience.

Recreating the image of Detroit has also been very important to me. Like Jeanette pointed out behind the Spirit of Detroit, the emblem inspired by the Detroit fire which says that once again Detroit will rise from it's ashes. I feel like this story of rebirth and recreation is a parallel with my life. I have a tattoo of a Phoenix, referring to my own rebirth from it's ashes, bursting into flames. This is why this has touched me, because I have been able to be a part of dismantling the current image of Detroit. We all have done very positive things in Detroit this week with ASB. We have all contributed to the rebirth of the city. And, we should all be very proud of that.

Wow. A quote I kept on hearing throughout the week was: "Nobody can accomplish everything, but everybody can accomplish something." Now more than ever, I realize the truth in that statement.

Thank you to United Way and their sponsors for making this week possible. Our group, and I'm pretty sure all the participants had a great week, which wouldn't have been possible without your support.

Building this ramp and watching Jason come down was such an accomplishment. My group worked tirelessly and extremely well together. I am proud of all of them, and glad we had an opportunity to make this happen!

Good bye :)
Muhi
Team 2: Boom-Roasted!

Today was our last day working at Lighthouse Path. We got to meet a woman who uses the services at Lighthouse Path, and it kinda hit home. After our conversation, we finished our last day by rearranging the daycare's storage room (which looked HORRIBLE). In the process, we found Shel Silverstein's Where the Sidewalk Ends. Jessica, one of the team leaders, read aloud a poem that basically sums up why we're all here...

Small as a peanut
Big as a giant,
We're all the same size
When we turn off the light.

Rich as a sultan,
Poor as a mite,
We're all worth the same
when we turn off the light.

Red black or orange,
Yellow or white
We all look the same
When we turn off the light.

So maybe the way
To make everything right
Is for God to just reach out
And turn off the light.

Well we ended up continuing our work at Vista Maria for Day 3 and Day 4 because they found more work for us to do. We had the awesome opportunity to continue our work with facilitates staff member Bob, while painting a 3-tiered hallway in a girls' dormitory area for the Bridges Program.

I'll write more about my observations and experiences in a different post, but here I wanted to highlight a story we found while working in the dormitory. I've seen in movies how girls in rehab or other institutions will write their stories or leave messages on the furniture in their rooms - dressers, beds, etc. While painting we found a dresser in one of the dorm rooms that had a story written in red marker on the side of the dresser that took up the entire side of the three drawer dresser. The story touched me in a number of ways, and so I wanted to post it in this blog so that others would have the chance to read it.

The Dresser Story (unedited):

"The System is meant 4 ur ass 2 fail!

Prove them Wrong!

I came from nothing the only person that showed me love (my momma) past away. My dady sold me to my momma. My aunt & uncle took me in after my mom died. My uncle raped me and took my pride which was my body I had nothing... I looked back to my family but they didn't believe me I cried myself to sleep every night in a place that I never felt safe enough to call home. I feel alone my whole family is in a different country (Philippines). The closest family I got lives somewhere in Chicago I have nobody but myself. Life is a struggle itself and my sleep can't help cuz I still have nightmares of getting beat up by "stepDAD" I was locked in the closset for hours... But I tell you that wasn't enough. I'm so use to pain that I punish myself by cutting I've almost taken my life away by pulling one of the veins out with a staple I got stitches before and I got my skin glued back together. I was born to fail But somehow I still keep going."

Reading this story, on the side of a wooden dresser, in a room that was MAYBE 8 feet by 10 feet for 2 people really weighed heavy on me. I don't know this girl...I don't know where she is today. But I've heard her story, and she does a very good job of telling it.

Life for me is so easy compared to this. Look at all the obstacles this young woman has to overcome just to get up in the morning, much less be successful or really make anything of her life.

Before the age of 18 this young woman had been sold, raped, lost her mother, beaten, locked in a closet, and had been cutting herself. And of the family she did have...no one believed her. Who do you turn to when your own family doesn't believe you? I can't even begin to fathom how I would deal with the challenges this girl faces.

Reading this story makes me thing about the assumptions we make, the conclusions we jump to about people in need. What do we not know about the people we interact with on a daily basis that makes them who they are? When a co-worker bites your head off, what's going on that you don't know about that could be creating that? When a child is misbehaving in school why do we always assume that they're just a bad kid? When someone is homeless, why do people so quickly turn to - oh they must be lazy or they wouldn't be homeless?

This is the story of a nameless young woman...a young woman who represents young women and men across our country and across the world. Young people who are born into situations and systems that set them up to fail. Young people who are dealt an unfair hand. For those of us who are dealt the winning hand...how can we be satisfied to just be happy with our lives and not reach out to those in need? Stories like this are why I volunteer, why I choose to be active in my community...because we're not all dealt the same hand, and sometimes all it takes to succeed in life is someone who cares. I don't go on these trips in service of others...I go on these trips to serve with others, to show our world that we care, and hopefully if and when I'm in a time of need, someone will care enough about me to reach out their hand as well.

This week I painted a boiler room and the hallway of a dormitory. The hallways of the Bridges program at Vista Maria are brighter and cleaner and provide the girls of Vista Maria a clean slate at the place they call home.

Keep going author of the dresser story...prove them wrong!!

MY FEET HURT SOOO BAD!!! Standing all day building a ramp with crappy shoes was a bad idea. But, at least it wasn't cold today.

THE END.

p.s. Team two WILL be boom roasted. Hardcore.

Wow, I'm impressed. I'm impressed with the amount of work that we did today. I'm impressed with my group because after coming off of a day filled with frustration, we had a day that passed everyones expectations.

This is us having fun:



These are memories we will never forget, these are friendships that will never break, these days our lives are weaving and we will remember it all.

More to come.
Peace and Justice,
Muhi

Apparently, everything "mysteriously" was blocked from the internet yesterday, so i'm going to attempt to recount the activities of today and today.

First and foremost, I LOVE my group! I'm having a blast, and I can't stop laughing! I have THE funniest team leaders, and everyone else adds onto it. We're painting apartments at Lighthouse Path for a family moving in by the end of the week. Today we finished painting all of our first apartment, so we were sent to rearrange the storage room, because the kiddies were still participating in nap time. For the last hr and a half, I believe, we got to play with the kiddies! Omjeeeeez! They're ALL absolutely adorable! I didn't want to leave =[. I took a few pics, and i'll upload them soon (I say that, but I have a feeling it's not going to happen until everything dies down. Tomorrow, we're working at rooms specifically for pregnant teens, and we're renovating over there.

After dinner, we had a few speakers come in to talk about the 211 program at United Way (if you don't know it, you should check it out). Ends up, we're supposed to finish our projects on Thursday, and for Friday, we're all joining together for a bigger project. 211 has been helping individuals who've been impacted by the state of our economy. Their main purpose is to help individuals to finds jobs or help volunteers find projects. Friday, we're all going on a job hunt in downtown Detroit to hopefully add on more contacts/resources for individuals using 211. I'm uber excited. Definitely different from what i've done in past years, and I think it's THE best idea for a project thus far.

My days have been ending earlier and earlier each day. I've been so tired, but i'm surviving! I'm having a blast and hope you all are having a blast as well!

Christina

Day 2 at Vista Maria with Team $killz - and I think it might be our last day. Our team was just simply amazing and powered through the project that the agency thought was going to take us four days in just two days. So now we are at a loss for work. Oh the story of managing volunteer projects. So tomorrow we are looking for backup projects - either with Grandmont Rosedale or Gleaners Food Bank. I'll update tomorrow on where we end up and what that project ends up looking like.

I wanted to give props to my group today though. I'm just continually amazed by their optimistic and positive attitudes. And we accomplished so much. I painted with a 30 foot pole today for the first time ever...A LOT harder than it sounds and looks. We painted like a 900+ square foot room from floor to ceiling in under an hour. We premiered the video of our newly launched professional dance crew (as unfortunate as it might be). I managed to not mess up any more Michigan left turns in the 15 passenger van or to get lost - which is more than I can say about yesterday. We practiced our walkie talkie lingo (Boiler Room to Bob). And we continued to bond without any hiccups along the way - definitely the most important accomplishment!

Today we had the opportunity to work with some of the girls that call Vista Maria home. We spent about an hour at the end of our day playing games with about 10 of the girls. All of the girls I interacted with were between the ages of 15 and 17. I always find my time spent just simply hanging out with the clients of the agencies we work with as definitely the most rewarding experience of my ASB trips. The work is great, and seeing a finished project provides a feeling of accomplishment...but really getting to talk with the clients of the agencies and hear their stories is why I keep coming back.

I look forward to what tomorrow has to bring!

I didn't have a chance to blog about my perceptions of Detroit on Sunday after our 3 hour tour of the city - why was amazing by the way! Thank you Jeanette from Inside Detroit (www.insidedetroit.org). But I was really challenged in my expectations for the city, so I feel that it's very important for me to share what I learned and experienced, especially to those of you back home.

I participate in these sorts of volunteer immersion experiences on a fairly regular basis. I have traveled to some of our country's most neediest cities to volunteer, usually staying in the most dangerous parts of the city. But for some reason, it was this trip to Detroit that really set all my friends and family on edge. Everyone always tells me to travel safely...but this time around, friends and family were legitimately concerned for my safety, and were not shy in expressing that concern.

I had done my research - I knew the stats about Detroit in terms of poverty, need, unemployment, murder, crime, drugs, etc. I also as an econ major had done a fair amount of studying on the pros and cons of urban growth boundaries - specifically as a case study looking at Detroit as an example of what happens with large population influxes and no urban growth boundary - basically the idea of urban sprawl, urban decay, and the Ring of Fire effect all compacted into one city. What happens when buildings start to age or problems arise in a neighborhood, and there's no limit to how a big a city can grow? So people start moving out, building new buildings, and abandoning the old. Quickly the oldest parts of your town are going to erode and it's just down hill from there without the proper supports in place.

Anyway, I came to Detroit not really sure what to expect. After all my research, I had really begun to associate the entire city of Detroit with poverty, need, and danger. And for some reason in my mind, I viewed the entire city in that manner. But I was SO wrong.

Don't get me wrong....Detroit definitely has needs. There are whole neighborhoods that are literally falling apart. Where one in four houses is boarded up and abandoned. The crime rates are staggering...and as America's capital for auto manufacturing....well I don't even need to finish that thought.

But the opportunities in Detroit are endless. The potential HUGE. And the current offerings of the city are immense. Detroit's downtown area is beautiful and offers everything that other large metro downtowns have to offer, including the country's second largest theater district, one of the largest varieties of restaurants (in fact 125 restaurants and bars in one square mile of downtown Detroit)...and OH did I mention, that you actually travel south from Detroit to enter Canada? You actually see Canada over the body of water that borders downtown Detroit! It's like a 20 or 30 minute drive. Amazing hospitals, gorgeous buildings, and so much history. I found it humorous when we drove by an old church that was celebrating it's 150th birthday...that's what Oregon is celebrating this year!

I guess what I want people to take away from this blog and my thoughts is really that even though Detroit has a lot of needs, it has a lot to offer too. All cities across our country have need....but that doesn't mean that they don't have anything to offer.

Let's identify the need. Let's ask ourselves why the need exists. And then let's ask what we can do to make sure the need doesn't exist in 5 or 10 years. But at the same time, let's look at the positives. And let me tell ya....Detroit has a lot of positives. So if you have a chance to come visit...I HIGHLY recommend it!

Have a Coney Dog while you're here - because they apparently started in Detroit. mmmm Yummy!