Day 1: Saturday

The morning started out with everyone meeting in Lot 1, talking about people forgetting their pillows and ways to improvise a pillow. The participants came up with using towels and sweaters as improvisations for pillows. When we got on the road mostly everyone fell asleep, and then once the mountains came into view everyone could not look away from the view. We arrived at our housing location of Camp Laurel and were given a warm welcome by two very adorable dogs. Then we had a serious competition of playing Taboo. The we were provided with a delicious feast by Mr. and Mrs. Bollings.

"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful committed citizens, can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has." -Margaret Mead

This quote was brought about by Sarah our staff advisor, during our discussion on Healthcare after we watched this video http://www.visionproject.org/documentary_film/crossroads.htm. During this video we were introduced to Roslain a single member of a community who traveled around to rural areas in Mississippi to look for people in the area who needed healthcare. These people in the rural backwoods of Mississippi are forgotten individuals, hidden for societal recognition, and in need of the generous assistance. She is an example of a individual striving to make a difference.  Often times we depend on our government (supreme court, president, congress) to make changes on the issue of healthcare. In reality, individuals like Rosalin and the small group that Margaret Mead described in the quote are the ones that are making a difference, caring for these people, and changing the world.

One of our arguments that followed this discussion centered around the question, "Whose responsibility is it? Is it the Governments or Individuals?

            -Mariel argued that it was both, that one person cannot change everything, that the responsibility needed to be a joint effort, with a satisfactory equilibrium: no one group having to carry that entire burden.

The quote on the back of our Alternative Breaks 2013 trip t-shirt has a quote that concludes this argument. It says, "I am only one, but I am one. I cannot do everything, but I can do something. And I will not let what I cannot do interfere with what I can do." -Edward Everett Hale

After our discussion on the rural healthcare documentary we did a activity called Winnie the Pooh and Friends Characteristics Contributing to the Community. With this activity we had each of the group members go stand next to a description of one of the Winnie the Pooh characters. Then we had everyone explain why they fit those characteristics, and how each of those characters all worked in a group dynamic. Each of these characters also plays a role in the social issue of rural poverty.

Group Member Characters:

Tigger:

• Rachel
• Stephanie
• Mariel

Pooh:

• Sabrina
• Carah
• Diana

Roo:

• Thomas

Gopher:

• Matt

Christopher Robin:

• Sarah

Kanga:

• Kelsie

·        One example is the Winnie the Pooh character of Rabbit plays the devils advocate, who has the willingness to admit when he is wrong, provides blunt/ frank/ honest perspective, brings order, detail and regulation to the group. People who consider themselves the Rabbit character are able to consider the other side of a argument, and in terms of rural poverty this is important because then we will not get a one- sided view of the social  issue. Rural poverty has many different facets that go unnoticed by the public and it is important to have people in our society that are able to stand apart from a group and express their viewpoints to different groups of people. The point of this exercise is to show  our group of participants that each character that they chose has positive qualities that can be used to benefit the education and community service aspects of this trip.

-Manpreet and Kemi