Living in a time of hatred and racially motivated violence does not seem to be within the popular consciousness of people in this country and of time period. Students were able to hear first-person accounts of people who've experienced these ordeals when survivors of the Rwandan Genocide and the Holocaust came to speak at the University on Monday, March 8. 

I swish around in my sleeping bag as I hear the roosters crowing in the distance. I pull myself out of my slumber, throw my old jeans and t-shirt on and head to the latrine and sink outside. Eventually, we head down the dirt-covered road to our host Myra's, house, where a lovely breakfast sits of rice and beans, eggs and fresh fruit. We make conversation with her children and laugh when someone makes a mistake in Spanish. After that, we head to the worksite where I participate in the hardest physical labor of my life.

Helping Hands is an organization created to perform community service tasks, among them, visiting and helping both the very young and elderly, as well as holding on-campus events, such as a Mocktail Cocktail Party, which benefitted victims of domestic abuse.

Afterword:

My trip to Nicaragua was not only about helping a community to build a sidewalk for their preschool, my trip was about connecting with a different culture and understanding different ways of living around the world.

January 15, 2010

Friday was our last day at the work site.  And upon leaving it was amazing to see how much we had accomplished in under a week. We only worked half a day on Friday because we wanted to have time to get ready for Shabbat in the evening. After lunch we split up into two groups. One group helped Myra and her family in the Kitchen preparing Shabbat dinner, and the other group helped to prepare the Challah for Motzi.

January 13, 2010

I have gotten to know the village pretty well at this point. Myra, a community leader, wife, and mother of two amazing boys, opens her home to us. Myra’s is where we eat all of our meals, and everyday she prepares mountains of food for us, all traditional foods catered to our liking. A favorite of the group is fried plantains, dipped in natural sugar, they are close to heaven. I never knew rice and beans, better known as Gallo Pinto, could be so tasty!

January 10, 2010:

 I am sitting on the bus and wondering how it is that I have ended up around all this natural beauty. Never in my eighteen years of living in the United States have I smelt such freshness. Nicaragua is beautiful. That is what I was thinking the whole three hours to the village I was staying in, Samulai.

Rabbi Meir Mitelman, Hofstra Hillel's Rabbinic Educator and University Jewish Chaplain had the honor and privilege to bless the Class of 2013 as they begin their journey at Hofstra University.  Watch the Convocation online.