“Nothing name can’t” is a phrase my mother would always say in moments of when obstacles seemed impossible to overcome, and now as a 17 year old I still live by those words. My name is Barrington Elvis Latham, born and raised in Boston,Ma, with parents born in Jamaica and Trinidad. I was given the opportunity to travel through a program called summer search; a program in which students are sent out of their comfort zone to persevere through many hardships and I was sent to Nicaragua. I didn’t know what to expect but I was excited to meet everyone and hopefully change many lives.

After 17 days it was finally my turn to put my experience to test and change lives by leading the delivery day of our CAP (community action project) and it was phenomenal. In the beginning the team was low on motivation and thought such a project would take at least a week. When it came time for my initiation as El Lider Del Dia I decided to get everyone’s hopes up and motivate them. When it came time for Big Love I made sure everyone got a turn so we could get a good vibe going.

After the Big Love I gave a speech to motivate everyone I said “We got to do a lot of work tomorrow, but it ain’t nothing we’re going to show everyone how California, Seattle, and Boston get work done!!.” Hearing the roars of the group of pure enthusiasm was overwhelming. For the unity clap we yelled out “unstoppable” because there was no stopping us. The next day I woke up everyone and they met downstairs on time, headed to breakfast then to la Casa de Cultura. I kept people encouraged and offered help to everyone on the team. When members of the team got distracted by the locals I reminded them to work, and those who continued stay distracted, I never forced to work but allowed them to face the consequences of the project not getting done on time. I reminded people to stay hydrated, for the most part it was an extremely productive day. We got the majority of the fence built and finished washing, scraping, and painting two walls.

I was extremely proud to be a leader having persevered through many difficulties. It was truly heartwarming when no one had any negative things to say about my leadership the positives that were said about my leadership were that; I was always helping someone, extremely nice, having one of the best nightly meetings ever, and giving great back rubs when a team member was stressed. I was truly sad but happy at the same time to pass the torch on, it was great to be leader but it was time to pass it on to a great person named Jeffery.

-Barrington Latham