vianca vianca2

Hello viewers! My name is Vianca Isabelle Diodonet. I´m 18 years old, and I attend Mott Haven Village Preparatory High School, in Bronx, New York. Everyday each of us global glimpsers wakes up to experience a new culture and a new life style. Nicaragua is a totally different place compared to the United States. We wake up with excitement to be doing something different as opposed to just staying home all day throughout summer. We all have different leadership skills which helps each leader throughout the day become a better leader and that’s what brings us together each day that passes. This is my second time being away for three weeks. I miss my family a lot but I am really enjoying myself out here. Today I was the leader of the day and I had to overcome the challenge of being shy. Being the leader of the day made me stand out and bond with other glimpsers, which was an amazing feeling to experience.

We started the day off by waking up bright and early at 7:15 am. After we got ready, we all met at the lobby at 8:00 am to do our head count in Spanish, which we have finally all mastered. Then we made our way to breakfast at our usual restaurant, Quiero Mas. We had two slices of bread with some ham and chesses, which was good. We also had some sweet lemon juice. After we finished we stood up to say gracias to the people that cook our three meals of the day.

We then walked back to our hostel with the sun shinning bright on us. We had free time today so when we got to the hostel people decided where they wanted to go in groups of four. Each group had a leader that was assigned to be responsible for the rest of the group coming back on time. I and three others decided to stay in. With my time I rested for a while because the heat drained my energy. Other people went to the supermarket, the market, the basketball courts, the cyber cafés and the central plaza. We all came back with smiles on our faces because we all love free time. Having free time gives us the opportunity to explore around Leon and have the time of our lives in a short amount of time, time always seems to fly during our free time.

At 11:45 we had lunch at Quiero Mas. We ate fried chicken with rice and beans which always fills us up. At 12:20pm we spilt into our seminar groups to head off to our field trip. One group went to a public high schooled called INO and the other group went to JFK high school. My group went to INO so we had to take the public bus there. The other group went to JFK and they walked to the school because it was three blocks away. When my group got to INO, we met the principal of the school in his air conditioned office, we didn´t want to leave. After we introduced ourselves to the him, we had the chance to see the school band play their instruments and dance, it was really nice to see. After that, each of us split up into different classes to shadow our high schooler for the day.

There were two students I shadowed today. I first sat in a science class. I thought the way the professor was teaching the students helped them understand really well. The kids did an activity where they were split into four groups. After they were to present their work, which I thought was cool because even though I barely understood Spanish the teacher´s hand gestures and movements helped me to understand the main concepts. I was soon shocked because I could not believe that the students had to pay for a copy of the worksheets that was needed for their activity; especially when they are in a public school. The bell rung and the kids packed their things and went to go get snacks and drinks. After their break the bell rung and we walked back into class. This time I was sitting in a math class that made me think about the question of the day which was, ”How does the style of education affect the population of a country?”  I began to realize that the students who really don’t pay attention sit in the back of the class and the students that want to learn sit in front. This style of education reminded me of my school and how those that choose to educate themselves rise out of poverty while those that choose to not educate themselves stay in poverty or enter into it.

Once school was out, we made our way to the bus stop and we walked to Quiero Mas where we met the other group for (cena) dinner. We had cheese burgers and it was great! During dinner, we talked about what we did in each school and everyone was happy to do what they did with the other students. After we had dinner and a nice talk we went to our Monday through Friday English tutoring class. We finally went to the hostel and had out nightly meeting. We reviewed our day and passed the torch to the next leader. We had a self reflection based on questions and people’s opinion.

After a long day and still more to come I am glad that I have chosen to come to Nicaragua and spend my three weeks here with such amazing people. In less then two weeks we built close friendships and bonds that can not be broken. I am glad to be in a great group and get the chance to experience a whole new culture with new friends. I really enjoyed my day as a leader and I hope more opportunities like this will happen more often.