Epicurean Adventures: Dessert

Posted by Emily

And now for the final course of my epicurean adventures. I apologize for the delay. Though I have been back on campus for a bit, I have been tied up with one of the non-travel related parts of my job: managing our engineering outreach and coordinating our Engineering Open House (EOH) programs. I should note, however, that EOH could be included in my epicurean adventures thanks to Carmichael Dining Hall (I highly recommend the spicy chicken quesadilla).

Baltimore:

□       I found myself in Baltimore for the national conference for the professional organization for college admissions counseling, subsisting mostly on Starbucks and convention center fair. But, this crab-lover found Phillips Seafood on the harbor to be a delight. To start we- a few college admissions friends from around the country- split a few orders of crab cakes and an order of crab stuffed mushrooms. It’s practically guaranteed that I will love mushrooms stuffed with anything (except broccoli which is one of very few foods I hate). These mushrooms were amazing. While a few others at the table opted for the crab mac ‘n cheese, I had to have my first ever whole soft-shell crab. It was so good I might have to add it to my death row meal.

Orlando:

□       I’m the type of road warrior that is loyal to my chosen hotel family brand: Hilton. Hotel reward points are certainly part of the equation, but when you’ve stayed at enough Doubletees or Hampton Inns or Homewood Suites they begin to feel familiar. For me, that familiarity makes it a little easier to be on the road. Similarly, sometimes I need to walk into a restaurant with no surprises- a menu I’m familiar with and comfort foods that make the road seem a little less lonely. Cheesecake Factory is my default. If I need to feel a little closer to home, I put Cheesecake into the GPS. And it’s not the main courses I’m drawn to- that I change up every time. Sometimes a salad, sometimes the fish tacos, sometimes the meatloaf. It is the cheesecake itself that provides the comfort. For most of my life people in my family have lovingly teased me for something I said when I was probably five years old: “cheesecake is the perfect food.” All throughout my childhood and into my early adulthood going out to lunch with my grandmother, affectionately called Nanny, was a treat. It was always only the girls (my mom, my sisters, Nanny and me) and we were often celebrating something: the purchase of a First Communication dress, a good report card, getting the lead in a play. We always lingered over our meals and dessert. It was our time; it was sacred. When I was really little we would often go to this place called The Open Hearth. I always ordered the tuna melt and never finished it. One day the waitress came by and asked if we wanted dessert. I perked up and said “cheesecake with strawberries, please.” She looked at me mock accusingly and said “but you didn’t finish your lunch.” Cheeky even at five, I looked up at her, blinked and said “but cheesecake is the perfect food.” And there began my love affair with cheesecake. I will forever associate it with Nanny and those lunches and it will forever make me happy as I sit alone reading while I’m on the road for work. In Orlando I opted for the pumpkin cheesecake.

Tampa:

□       The heat in Tampa (88 degrees and 96% humidity) led this upstate New Yorker to seek dining al fresco and on the water whenever possible. I prefer a sea breeze to air conditioning. I started out at Crabby Bill’s just off the causeway with a Miss Dolores Platter of fried haddock, shrimp, clams and oysters. It was decent. The view was worth it, though.

□       The only time in Tampa that I didn’t pick a restaurant with a deck on the water was when I went to The Columbia Restaurant in Ybor City, Tampa’s Latin Quarter. I had been at the Ybor City location once before for a private event and had loved the Cuban food and the festive atmosphere so much that I brought my in-laws to the Clearwater location a couple of years ago to try the tapas (you all remember how much I love tapas, right?). What is particularly special about the Ybor City location is the nightly Flamenco shows.

I enjoyed my gazpacho, “la completa cubana” (a Cuban feast of Roast Pork, Boliche, Empanada de Picadillo, platanos, yuca, black beans and yellow rice) and Churros Tres Amigos (a basket of churros accompanied by three delicious sauces- guava, caramel and chocolate) at a lovely little table for one right next to the stage. It was so much fun. Next time you’re in Tampa, I highly recommend dinner and show at The Columbia.

□       For my last night in Tampa, I decided to catch the sunset at Clearwater Beach on the deck of Frenchie’s Rockaway Grill. The surprise of the night was when my waiter turned out to be a classmate from my high school! I’m from a town that has less than 7,000 people (maybe 11,000 if you include the town and the village) and not that many of us move away. In true Emily style, I ordered the Four Kings: Grouper, crab cakes, grilled shrimp and calamari. My classmate Ryan suggested I get the fish Cajun-style. It was delicious. Nothing like a beachside joint to take the cake on fantastic grilled fish.

Evanston:

□       My final trip of the season what a quick jaunt back to Chicagoland. My trip was fast and furious and so I spent a bit more time in Corner Bakeries and Ruby Tuesdays than I like to admit. That said, I took Laura and Kyle’s suggestion and checked out Joy Yee’s Noodle Shop- the Evanston branch. I know they both raved about the bubble tea, but I’m a little afraid of those black floating tapioca balls. I ordered a blueberry lemonade which was delicious- though if I return again I will have to try the pineapple. I made my way through most of a giant bowl of egg roll vermicelli with grilled chicken. It was good enough to finish, but I was pretty sure I wouldn’t be able to walk to the car if I ate any more! Thanks, Laura and Kyle for the suggestion.

And that, my friends, is that! With reading season right around the corner, my epicurean adventures may have to be limited to my little kitchen in Somerville. Bon appetite!

Pep Talk, Kind of.

Post By Jen

Jen at Taj

In 2000, while you were in elementary school, I traveled to Asia on my first Council of International Schools tour.  If you are a student at an international school or an American school outside the United States, chances are good that CIS has done a college fair at your high school.

My first CIS tour lasted about three weeks. We traveled throughout Asia; China, India, Nepal, Singapore and Korea were all stops.  I remember our first group meeting in Los Angeles before our flight to Beijing.  The group leader told the participants what we could expect. She had arranged all the school visits and as she addressed us I thought, “How can one person coordinate this whole trip for 25 people?”  I was so happy to sit back and let someone else deal with the logistics of getting me from place to place in foreign lands.  When the trip was over, I complimented her and told her I couldn’t imagine how she managed something so complex. I couldn’t envision myself taking charge as she had, being organized in the way that she needed to be.   I couldn’t imagine myself being a leader.

Nine years later almost to the day, I finished leading 27 college and university representatives around India on a CIS tour. We visited schools in Chennai, Madurai, Delhi, Mumbai, Dhera Dun and Pune.  We spent seemingly endless hours on various forms of transportation as we made our way to schools across the vast and exotic country.  In groups of three, we took jeeps through a wild elephant preserve when a necessary bridge was washed out by monsoon rains.  We saw monkeys, peacocks, horses, cows, goats, camels and elephants–all on our way to school visits. And most importantly, we saw hundreds of bright, motivated students looking to study in the U.S.  By all accounts, the trip was a success.

You probably think that this is the part where I tell you that you too can do the things that you think you cannot do. Well, you can and you will but that’s obvious.

I’m here to tell you that if you are doing this life thing right, getting into the school of your dreams is only the first of many challenges that await you. That is the moral of this blog entry and therein lies the rub: getting into college is merely the beginning.  It is only the beginning of thinking, “there is no way I could do that” and then repeatedly proving yourself wrong.  Life done right is thinking you can’t do something because you’re not organized enough, not bold enough, not imaginative enough, not smart enough, and then proving yourself wrong.  When you allow yourself to be so daunted by something that it boggles your mind to think that anyone—much less you—could ever do it, then you are pushing yourself to your limits.

I’m back from my trip to India and eagerly awaiting my next adventure, the next thing that scares me for a moment before I tackle it.  After you get your college applications completed, I suggest you do the same.

Epicurean Adventures, The Second Course

Post by Emily

If I’ve starved your for the continuation of my epicurean adventures, I do apologize. Here’s Part II of my culinary travels.

Chicago:

□       The Weber Grill has secured its place in my eating itinerary for Chicago. I tried it out last year and for a girl raised on a charcoal grill (I will never own a gas grill) this tastes like home. I would recommend trying to sit where you can see the open kitchen. You can watch meals being prepared on huge kettle grills fueled by charcoal that’s prepped in Weber charcoal chimneys (my dad has one). For us single diners, the place to be is at the grill counter where you’re just feet away from all the action. This time around I had the filet with garlic mushrooms, mashed potatoes and a wedge salad and it surpassed my high expectations.

□       From Laura’s blog you know she joined me in Chicago on a training trip and after our TOT (Tufts on Tour) we met up with Laura’s parents for dinner at one of her family’s favorite restaurants: Joe’s. The inside feels like it hasn’t changed since the 1920’s: beautiful hardwood, leather booths and tux clad servers. The menu is packed with classic items like steak and seafood and they feature stone crabs. Crab bisque, tortilla crusted mahi mahi and the Havana cake for dessert helped me see why this is a Shaprio family favorite.

□       The semi-regional Big Bowl- a self-described causal Asian restaurant- didn’t leave an impression for dinner, but the homemade ginger ale and banana egg rolls are worth stopping by.

□       Heaven on Seven has become where I stop for dinner before hitting the AMC Movie Theater on North Michigan when I stay Chicago. The menu is almost intimidating if you’re not well versed in Lousianna chow, but you can’t go wrong if you start with the gumbo which is heavenly. I followed it up with a fried oyster salad and should have followed up with dessert. I had to forego the pie to get to The Informant (which I chose because Steven Soderbergh and it’s location in Decatur, IL).

□       I mentioned in my last post my love of tapas. For small plates of the Italian variety, I recommend Quartino. One of the best Italian meals I’ve ever had and I’ve been to the North End in Boston, a lot. I opted for three small plates: baby spinach with pears and walnuts, skirt steak with garlic and tomato relish and penne a la vodka. Amazing.

□       When I’m feeling like the meals on the road are getting a little heavy, that’s when I go searching for sushi. Lucky for me the sushi restaurant next to my hotel was divine! I have a pretty standard order when I’m by myself: seaweed salad, eel roll, spider roll. Oysy Sushi didn’t disappoint. The sushi was fresh and flavorful and the calm décor was perfect after a busy day of school visits.

□       I had my heart set on checking out a restaurant called Farmerie 58 for brunch on Sunday- my only non-working day while on my three week trip. I’d walked by the restaurant multiple times during my stay in Chicago and was intrigued: the menu looked great and they had a commitment to local, sustainable farms. Caramel French toast with hazelnuts and sour cherries here I come. Sunday could have been the most disappointing day on my trip. When I walked up to Farmerie 58 the windows were covered in brown paper, the lights were off and there was a sign on the door. They had closed the night before! I consoled myself in the banana pecan pancakes at The Grand Luxe Café- which reminded me of The Cheesecake Factory- and mustered enough cheer to check out an exhibit at the Chicago Cultural Center on cartoonist John McCutcheon. The day was salvaged!

□       Next time you’re in Chicago and hungry, go to Greektown. Two years ago I tried Pegasus and loved it. This year Greek Islands gets an A+ for food and atmosphere.  Amidst the waiters yelling OPA! while lighting cheese on fire, I ate my platter piled high with Greek favorites: lamb, moussaka, meatballs, dolmas. If I’d had room, I would have attacked the baklava. I think next time I’ll have to skip straight to dessert or head to one of the many Greek bakeries in Greektown and call that dinner.

□       My last meal in Chicago was a dinner out with the family of a certain Tufts Junior who happens to be studying abroad and blogging about it. They took me to one of their Chicagoland favorites: VTK or Vong’s Thai Kitchen. It was so nice to share a meal with Kyle’s family. VTK has a great family style option and we took advantage of it. The food was fantastic and he company even better. The miso-glazed salmon was great, but I think the panang curry was my favorite.

Left to come: Baltimore (including an all crab dinner) and Tampa! I’m heading back to Chicago this week. Any restaurant suggestions?

BREAKFAST! The most caramel filled meal of the day!

Post by Dan (though, inspired by Emily)

I’ll confess, I don’t follow the advice of my elders, nutritionists, or the Food Network when it comes to breakfast.  Nearly always, I skip it, power through until lunch, and then gorge myself on the sheer glory of a sandwich from Dave’s Fresh Pasta.

Visiting high schools creates new appetite demands; waking up early enough for the Montgomery County Public Schools’ first period, with its alarmingly early 7:25am start time, has a way of inspiring breakfast.  (Seriously, why so early?!?)  So, I consume a fruit smoothie from a bottle, munch on cereal or a baked good, and I’m out the door to battle the DC suburban traffic (My weapon of choice for this: a flail and a shield).  Today, however, my morning includes a short reprieve from the visits.

So today, my breakfast is different.

The Mini Rogel. She is beautiful, no?

The divine inspiration pictured above is called the Mini Rogel and is served at an Argentinian style bakery called Lola’s Bistro Cafe & Bakery in Rockville, MD.  It is, according to menu, “Layers of Flaky Dough with Dulce de Leche and topped with Italian meringue.”  What I’ve learned from this: every morning is made better by the presence of caramel.  And.  I love Argentinian pastry.

And now, I’m off to Bullis.

Dan out.

Epicurean Adventures

Posted by Emily

Danielle wrote this summer about her “dream job.”  Danielle’s natural instinct is to recommend (or as she admitted push) books and we love her for it. If I weren’t occupying my office in Bendetson Hall as an admissions officer, I truly believe that I would probably turn my back on my degrees in education and theater in favor of one thing.

Food.

Now, I wouldn’t call myself a gourmet. Foodie might be a better term for my particular brand of nourishment worship. I love to cook. I love to try new restaurants. I love to eat. I love to guess the ingredients in dishes I sample. I love kitchen gadgets. I love planning menus. Some of the best conversations I’ve ever had have occurred over a table filled with tapas.

I would say I’m more Julie Powell than Julia Child minus the whining and quarter life crisis.

Perhaps my dream job would be in the Food Network Test Kitchen or as a columnist for Bon Appetite magazine or a researcher for Epicurious.com. I do have Epicurious, the Food Network and Open Table apps on my iPhone.

In the rush of travel season when we run from hotels to school visits to college fairs and back again in a rental car in not-so-familiar city, it is my epicurean adventures that keep me sane. Grab a snack and enjoy a sample of the feasts of three weeks of travel through Memphis, Nashville, Chicagoland and Baltimore.

Note: My apologies to the vegans and vegetarians out there. My only excuse is that I’m from central New York. (UPSTATE!)

Memphis:
□       At the home a friend in Midtown, I dined on amazing grilled pork chops with homemade ancho chile sauce, roasted root veggies and a to-die-for salad topped with dried cherries, gorgonzola and spiced walnuts. I still need to write to the host to request the recipes for both the ancho cile sauce and the spiced walnuts.

□       Always a fan of the prix fixe menu, I’ve found set menus at high end restaurants make for great indulgences that remain with the fiscal confines of a travel budget. For example, my second night in Memphis I took advantage of the prixe fix at Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse and enjoyed a salad, filet mignon topped with grilled shrimp, mashed potatoes and a dessert duo (a thimble of crème brulee and a thimble of raspberry mousse) for under $40. Not bad.

□       Why go to Memphis if you’re not going to have BBQ, right? After asking around at school visits for recommendations, I settled on Central BBQ. At the suggestion of my server I ordered a “half and half” rack platter. Within in minutes a rack of ribs with a beautiful dry rub crust, half covered in a delicious BBQ sauce (hence the name “half and half”) arrived at my table nestled in a basked with my chosen sides of mac and cheese, collard greens and corn bread. It was messy and delicious and I’ll be talking about Central BBQ for years!

Nashville:
□       On my way to the movies I had dinner at Calypso Café, a Caribbean restaurant with a great variety of fruit teas. Try the black bean nachos. They are fantastic.

□       The Loveless Motel in Nashville was a shining star- at least for this southern food lover. I visited this local haunt with a friend from college who promised me “true blue Nashville cooking.” Boy, did I get it: catfish, fried chicken and country ham with fried okra and caramel pecan sweet potatoes. The Loveless Motel is famous for their homemade biscuits and preserves as well as their generous “meat and three” meals. Clearly I went for the “three meat” option. The ambiance is adorable. The restaurant building is the former office of the motel while the motel rooms themselves are filled with interesting little shops. The barn on the property is now a music venue. I loved the Loveless so much, I bought myself an apron to commemorate the occasion. The Loveless has found it’s way into my heart and maybe next time I’ll try to catch a show while I’m there.

There’s your first taste of what has been referred to around Bendetson as “Emily’s trip eating across America.” Stay tuned for Chicago and Baltimore!

Travel Training Trip (say that three times fast)

Post by Laura

The walls of college guidance offices are plastered with announcements. The Google calendars of admissions officers (Outlook if you like to keep things old school) are packed with appointments. It’s travel season. Manning rental cars and armed with pamphlets, it’s this time of year that admissions staffers take to the open road to divide and conquer. It’s exciting. It’s an adventure.

It’s tiring.

As a high school student, there are really only two things you need to know about school visits: which colleges are interesting enough to compel you to talk to an admissions officer, and when to show up at the guidance office. (This excludes the category of students who just love an excuse to miss class. I know you’re out there. It’s okay.)

This will be my first travel season, and as Tufts tradition dictates, I went on a “training trip” to learn the ropes. Because someone in this office loves me, the destination chosen was Chicago, which is both my hometown and the single greatest city on Earth. Not that I’m biased.

I spent a couple of days with Emily Roper-Doten, as Illinois is her territory. Many valuable insights ensued:

1) For the directionally challenged, a GPS is a no-brainer travel season accessory for zipping between schools with ease. In my case, it’s really more like a lifelong relationship that will continue to be cultivated this fall, when I bring my Garmin along for my trip from Kansas to Missouri to Ohio to Kentucky to Indiana. Wow, I got tired just hyperlinking that. Though Emily’s rental GPS had some trouble navigating amongst the tall buildings, we are road warriors, undefeated by global positioning snafus.

2) There is no such thing as traveling “light” when you’re distributing dozens of pieces of printed materials several times each day. Observe the trunk of Emily’s cherry red rental:

3) Wrinkle-resistant clothing is a plus. Acquire whenever possible. If you’re me, your staggeringly helpful mother should be enlisted to provide assistance.

4) Align yourself with one of several major hotel chains and book as many rooms as possible from within that family of hotels. Sit back and watch rewards points accumulate.

5) Drink coffee. School visits start early.

6) But not too much coffee. Bathroom breaks can be few and far between.

And so, thanks to my training trip, I find myself one week away from the start of my own travel season, and READY. The hotels are booked, the materials are sent, the GPS is already in my suitcase. I am well-caffeinated and wrinkle-free. Bring it.

Summer Travels

Post by Ben

Alas, summer is over.   So I thought this would be a good time to recount memories of summer 2009—my three week trip across northern Europe.  A seven-hour flight from Boston brought my two suitcases, backpack, messenger bag (and me) to Berlin (Germany), Tallinn (Estonia), St. Petersburg (Russia), Helsinki (Finland), Stockholm (Sweden), Copenhagen (Denmark), and Amsterdam (The Netherlands).  Here I am enjoying the sights and sounds of the Ikean capital:

It was a great trip that provided me with some life-long insights:

(1)  Leave more than two hours for a layover in Amsterdam, because otherwise you will miss your flight to Copenhagen and end up in Berlin with a five-hour train ride to a port city on the Baltic Sea no one at the train station has heard of.

(2)  Pickled herring is not yummy.

(3)   Estonians and Finns are blonder than Swedes and Danes.

(4)  You don’t need to see your dinner to eat your dinner.

(5)  There may be such a thing as too much gold.

Now the “Grand European Tour” is nothing new—as I learned in Russia, Peter the Great went to Amsterdam for spring break—I mean vacation—and that’s where he got the idea of building St. Petersburg on a series of canals.  That was one of the most interesting insights of my trip.  Everywhere I went, people before me had traveled and been inspired.  Peter went to Amsterdam and back; Swedes built St. Olaf’s church in Tallinn (which was the tallest building in the world from 1549-1625); the Lutheran break from the Catholic Church in Finland was accomplished by Mikael Agricola, who had learned about Lutheranism from his professor, Martin Luther, when he was studying in Wittenburg, Germany; the fortress island outside of Helsinki has been known as Sveaborg (when used by the Swedes against the Russians) and Krepost Sveaborg (when used by the Russians against the Swedes) and Suomenlinna (when used by the Finns against the Russians); the Russian Winter Palace is adorned with the Rembrandts purchased from Empress Josephine of France after Napoleon’s defeat in 1815; civil marriage in the United States was an idea that the English colonists known as “the pilgrims” learned in the Netherlands before they brought the idea to America when they founded Plymouth Colony in 1620; Christian IX of Denmark was father-in-law to no fewer than four European monarchs from whom almost all modern European royalty are descended.  When people travel, they bring back home transformative new ideas.

That’s one of the things I love most about Tufts.  Students here come from everywhere (69 countries and 43 states), and they go everywhere (over 40% of the junior class studied abroad last year).  The Fletcher School was the first school of international relations in the country, the most popular major is international relations, and every Tufts student studies a foreign language and culture.  Whether you study history, biology, Chinese, or engineering, this place is like a four-year world tour.  And that can’t help but transform you.

In the spirit of collaboration

Post by Isabel

I met with our tour guides last night to kick off our fall semester of guiding, and I learned a cool fact about Tufts…

In remembrance of September 11th, last night the Tufts Democrats and the Tufts Republicans came together and painted the canon.  (If you don’t know the story of the Tufts cannon, come take a tour with us!)

To quote one of my favorite students who participated…

“We got together last night, but we didn’t guard it because we figured that no Tufts student with a heart would paint over it. My friend  actually did the lettering. It looks really good. You should go look at it!! (I haven’t seen it in the sunshine yet, but hopefully it is still there!!) It is kind of humorous that while we all gathered to paint the cannon together in remembrance of 9/11, they could not hold themselves back from debating politics.

If you’re wondering, yes, it did survive the night (Confused? The rules are:  The cannon may only be painted at night, and must be guarded until sunrise to prevent usurpers from coming and painting it out from under you. )

Dispatch from Singapore

Post by Dan

The admissions travel season officially kicked off this past Friday when I stepped onto United Flight 897 and began 26 hours of travel across thousands of miles and a dozen time zones from Boston to Singapore.  If one were to translate my level of excitement into units of height, final measurements would be taken somewhere around the Tropopause – my favorite atmospheric layer (I like its contradictions).  My heart aches to write a more coherent and cohesive account of my (mis)adventures on Tufts’ behalf in lands faraway, but my clock, still set to Boston time, says 12:23pm.  This is bad, since it means I should have gone to sleep an hour ago.

In the meantime, here are some pictures of Singapore, courtesy of my iPhone.

If I had brought food, I would have eaten it straight off the ground, that's how clean Singapore's airport is. Also, take note of my arrival time.

Singapore plays host to Formula 1's only night race later in September. People are excited. So excited, in fact, that someone created a Formula 1 car made entirely out of bread.

One of our Singaporean freshman, Shreya, recommended a seafood restaurant called Jumbo. I cannot ignore the serendipity of sampling one of Singapore's signature dishes, chili crab, in an establishment that shares Tufts' mascot's name.

The First Members of 2013: Part 3

Post by Dan

In two days, just two short days, approximately 1,300 students will move into their dorm rooms, en masse, and become the Tufts First-Year Class.  For some of us in admissions, and for me specifically, this is the most exciting day of the year.   We will actually, finally, get to meet our class – face to face.  For most of our incoming students, the span of time between high school and college is just a few months.  For a small group , the gap is much larger.

Twenty of our incoming students did something uncommon and wonderful; they took the year off.   Jessica spent a year falling in love with Brazil.   Ben digested politics in Israel.    Caroline left George to live at a Ghanaian orphanage.  In making those choices, those twenty students became the first members of their class.

I’d like to share with you reflections from one such student: Alexandra Duncan from Darien,  Connecticut.  Alex holds a special place among our gap year students because I’ve been following her journey right from the beginning.  It was my privilege (really, it felt like a privilege) to read Alex’s application to Tufts and I still remember the e-mail she sent in February of 2008 with her intent to take a gap year to “go to Uganda with Invisible Children this summer, then possibly to a conservation project in the Peruvian rain forest, then to work in an orphanage in Ethiopia.”  And Alex made good on her plans, keeping a blog along the way, of which I’ve read every post.  Below are her thoughts, looking back on her year and what it means moving forward and into Tufts.

By Alexandra Duncan:

I have wanted to take a gap year since about eight grade- it was like the light at the end of the tunnel.  But I also wanted it to mean something, not just be a chance for me to travel and have fun.  Honestly, it turned out even better than I hoped.

Throughout high school I worked with Invisible Children, an NGO (non-governmental organization) that helps educate kids affected by the war in Uganda, while getting media and political attention for the plight of the child soldiers used to fight the war.  It also helps people who were dislocated by the fighting.  Senior year my high school’s club raised the most money to help our partner school of all the schools in New England, and as a result I got to go to Uganda in July with the twelve other kids who raised the most money from around the country.  I spent two weeks in Gulu, Uganda, meeting with community leaders, students, and people living in the IDP camps.  It was the most life-altering two weeks I’ve ever spent.  I made friends with a few girls at one of the schools I visited- they lived in an IDP (internally displaced persons) camp with distant relatives because their parents were dead.  They were shocked that both my parents are still alive.  Children swarmed around my friends and me wherever we went, shouting ‘Mono! Mono!’, which means ‘white person! white person!’ in Luo, the language spoken there.  Many of the kids had distended bellies that contrasted oddly with their stick thin arms and legs- a result of malnutrition.  Many also had belly buttons that stuck out a few inches, which is a sign of worms.  I met the head boy and head girl at my partner school- the money the schools in America had raised for them had been used to nearly double the size of their tiny school.

I returned to America with an entirely different understanding of what it means to be a responsibly human, and of what really matters in the world. But I still didn’t understand enough - I didn’t get how the mess the world is in occurred, and what I could do to change it.

Which was fine, because my gap year hadn’t even started yet, really.  September fourth, I left for my gap year proper, with Thinking Beyond Borders.   TBB is a program that travels around the world for eight months, studying five different issues of international development.  I spent my year doing completely crazy things – building eco-toilets in a tiny, indigenous village in Ecuador; teaching English in China; shadowing scavengers in Vietnam as they collected, separated, and sold recyclable materials from the streets of Ho Chi Minh City; farming and weaving in a tiny village in Northern Thailand; and working with a home based care worker in a township in South Africa.  We studied the issues tied to our work in depth – so when I wasn’t the care worker in South Africa, I was at seminars about the complex issues of HIV and public health.  Thailand was sustainable agriculture, China was public education, Vietnam waste management and the environment, and Ecuador was clean water.  I learned about the history of these issues, how they continued today, how they affected people’s lives, and most important – what I could do about them.  In between our hard work and intense studying we did crazy, cool, things – like hiking the Inca trail to Machu Picchu, going on safari, and learning to SCUBA dive.  At one point we attended a political rally in Ecuador, and got spoken to by the president!

I’ve finished up my year, and I realize I’m ready to go to college.  I need a break!  Which is, of course, why I took my year in the first place.  I’m ready to make the most of Tufts and use what I learned this year to actually make a difference.  Taking a gap year was probably the best decision I’ve ever made.  I learned a lot about how the world actually works, and how people live under circumstances so different from my own.  I learned what I wanted to learn – how to understand the mess I read about in the newspapers, and what I can do to change it.