I’ve decided to make this post much less artistic and more direct. To be blunt, I have not been changed by my service project. It has not awakened a crazy passion that I never knew existed, nor has it challenged me in any way. Perhaps it’s my fault. Although I did the best with what I was given, maybe it was not good enough.

What was I given?

My community organization is all about art. From puppetry, to traditional Bolivian dances, the organization immerses the children from the neighborhood in a world where only art exists. This, as it sounds, is quite beautiful. I am a proponent of the arts; I love dance and song, and I support art as a healthy medium through which anyone can coop. For the children, most of which lived in what was noticeably an impoverished neighborhood, that’s exactly what it was. To them, it was an escape from the dirt road neighborhoods where food was scarcely provided by government agents. This is wonderful! But, it’s also stagnant. No common person can revolutionize art. Choreography will also be taught the same, reading is reading, and music is done by the talented. In an organization such as this, it’s very hard to be revolutionary. It’s very hard to make an enormous impact simply because to do so, you’d have to change art entirely.

My assigned task was to “help out” in all of the classes. I was requested to spend 5 days a week, for 8 weeks, as a teaching assistant. What does that entail? Well, as I was not the professional folklore dancer of the group (that role had been taken) I learned the same choreography as the kids. I read the character El Diablo” in numerous short stories. I occasionally translated a few English words that were used to make shirt designs. Lastly, I learned to play soccer. In any of these, where is the challenge? Where is the call to invoke a life changing act? I was no volunteer, if anything, I was one of the children.

Within the third week, FSD (the host organization) forced me to propose my own project within my community organization. This project needed to be relation to my assigned task, measureable, and outlined in a 3 page excel spreadsheet. Perhaps I will withdraw my earlier statement. I was challenged. Having to think of any relevant project from which anyone would actually benefit, was challenging. The obvious fallback was to teach my own class, maybe dancing or singing. However, I don’t have those talents to teach. Of course one might say “well, it’s not supposed to be easy. You’re supposed to challenge yourself and grow as a person.” yes, that’s a very Rice response. Yet, unlike farming, social justice, or construction, arts are not something you can make significant progress in without the natural talent, which I don’t have.

After several stressful days of reconsidering the Loewenstern fellowship, I finally did an analysis of what I can do. It took a painful realization that I’m not the best toy in the box, but I am capable of one thing; event planning. I have had experience with planning events, and always told myself I’d become a wedding planner at some point. So I decided to plan a showcase of all the classes offered by the organization. The purpose of this showcase called Children’s Day, was to raise awareness in the community about how beneficial the program was to society. I talk to the organization director about saving my time and not going to the classes, and instead using it to connect with local citizens and companies to support the event and the program. It was easy. Maybe I am a natural, or maybe it’s so easy that anyone can do it.

To summarize, I was not changed nor challenged by my Loewenstern experience. I’m sorry, but I won’t sugarcoat it. I did not awaken a hidden passion, I’ve always like event planning, and I have done it before. I did not connect emotionally with the children; I enjoyed working with them and helping them with English while they taught me colloquial Spanish. Do I think that my community organization is a waste of time? Absolutely not. Again, I really see and treasure the valued that it represents. Art, more that sports, is one of the best ways to grow and mature in a nonviolent and constructive manner. I wish the organization could be larger and reach more of the world. What they do is excellent! However, it’s not a place for a student volunteer who is not artistically gifted to find meaningful work. Am I disappointed with the Loewenstern fellowship? No, not at all. This was an amazing opportunity that in many other circumstances would have realized the hopes that I’d had for myself. With a different, more personally relatable community organization, I know that this summer would have been the best. I am very thankful for the opportunity to travel to Argentina and learn their culture. Even though I did not grown tremendously and I will not return an entirely new person as a result of my service project, I have grown a bit. I know more about the world than I did before, my Spanish has improved, I have an idea of what I would not like to do, and I have made many friends here with whom I was able to share my culture.