Mural: Day 1

On Saturday I went to school to paint my mural. I arrived at around 9:30, and everyone was there already. I was doing two panels, while my partner Hannah did the other two. First, we had to draw out our design in pencil on the boards, use a ruler to divide up our panels into sections, and put tape around the edges of the lines (to keep the paint from going into other spaces/sections). My design was a flower, with ivy vines, an owl, and complicated swirls.

After we were done we were allowed to paint, I started on my flower petals, and then after I was done moved onto the ivy vines. We worked until 12:00, but I hadn't even finished one panel yet. We were asked to clean up, and had to wash our paint containers, and paintbrushes before leaving. Lucie Vovk was very creative in her painting, she decided not only to decorate the wall, but also my face. So my nose, and cheeks were covered in bright blue acrylic paint (which took forever to get off, but was awesome).

Lucie Vovk's mural 

This experience was very fun, and I enjoyed putting together my mural. I'm looking forward to this Saturday, and next Wednesday when I'll be able to complete the painting.

Model United Nations

Model United Nations aims to educate students about current events, topics in international relations, and how the United Nations is built up, and their agenda. Students role-play as diplomats representing a nation in a committee of the United Nations (security council etc.). We will receive a country, investigate its international issues, and then develop solutions to world problems. We will get to go to conferences in Nairobi, and perhaps later on, in different countries.

The skills that you need for, or will get out of MUN are public speaking, group communication, research, policy analysis, good listening, negotiating/debating, conflict resolution, and note taking.

In the first MUN meeting, Dr. Wilder told us about MUN, for example what it will teach us, and how we will benefit from it. He also informed us about the various conferences, and debates we are going to have. We all had to sign are names on a piece of paper, write what weeks we were coming, and whether or not we had done MUN before.

In the next few meetings we had a quiz on the structure of the UN, and how it was formed, etc. We also had to come up with a resolution for a world problem, and read it to the rest of the group. I didn't know much about the UN, only a little that I had learned in middle school last year so this was hard for me.

I think that this will be a great experience, and that I will learn a lot from it. However, I know that it's going to be a huge challenge. I may have difficulty coping with the work load, and the public speaking part. I will be able to apply what I learn in MUN, in a variety of experiances outside, or even inside, of school.

The Family Challenge

This is a little late, but on September 10th, and 11th, I did the family challenge. The family challenge is an event that raises money for the Kamili Trust, an organisation that helps people in Kenya with mental health problems. We donated 20,000 shillings for the trust, which will be used to build clinics, and train nurses.

The family challenge is a two day event (you camp overnight), which consists of various challenges/ activities. For example in one activity you had to cross a "mine-field", you could only step on small pieces of cloth, and you had to hold hands with the other members in your group. If the chain was broken, or someone touched the ground, you had to start from the beginning again. There were water bottles scattered around, which you also had to collect. Our team was called the lionhearts, and it was me, my mom, lezer getahun, lezer's mom, and my little brother, Ben.

My personal objectives were to help people with mental disabilities, while having fun at the same time. I didn't encounter any difficulties, besides Naivasha being too hot over the challenge. I learned about the Kamili Trust from this activity, as before the famiy challenge I didn't even know it existed, and that you can help people and enjoy yourself while doing so. I can apply what I've learnt to new situations by telling friends that know people with mental disabilities about the Kamili Trust.

I thought that this was a fun way to help the community, and I really enjoyed the challenge. The food was provided (though you had to pay for the meals), and the campsite was amazing.
At the end of the weekend, they gave out prizes for each challenge, an overall prize for the winners of the challenges, and those who raised the most money. We won the prize for the driving challenge (driving through an obstacle course blindfolded), and got a shirt, and a medal.