📌 Edition 19
📆 March 2022

🌎 Copán Ruinas, Honduras

 
 

🥾 UrbanTrekkers

  • Environmental awareness activity - Cleaning Copán

  • Intercultural activity - Creating clay pots

  • Leadership growth - Bonfire

🎯 General Programs

  • World Vision and local Municipality Meeting trip

  • Informative meetings with Camp’s parents

  • National University (UNAH) Webinar

💼 Admin

  • Capacity building within finance team

  • Finishing Campus Master Plan

🎒 After School Program

  • Father’s day gift preparation

  • Talk "Covid-19 Post pandemic impact"

  • Student Council elections for each camp

🦜 Youth Program

  • New Camp Inauguration Rincón del Buey

  • Youth training and mentoring

  • Ambassadors program launched (youth who are about to start college)

  • Beginning of the year retreat

  • Interviews with applicants for scholarships

🚀 Development

  • Land Hype Video

  • Circus Postcard to our lovely donors

🎨 Artist-In-Residence Program

  • Painting activity with staff to inspire/awaken creativity or to cultivate vision

All these activities AND MANY MORE! are made thanks to your monthly support

🎪

All these activities AND MANY MORE! are made thanks to your monthly support 🎪

 
 
 
 

“Near the top, there’re always a thousand excuses to go down and only one to go up”.
Ramón Portillo - Spanish alpinist 

It's intriguing how a trek up a mountain can teach you many important lessons and make you reflect on areas of your life to strengthen.

It is exciting but intimidating when someone invites you to climb a mountain: "Yeah, that sounds like fun!" you say. —And it is, truly, it is! When you reach the top, you appreciate the landscape and connect each part of your body with the whole of nature, the trees, rocks, the grass, the birds, or an extraordinary view from above—exactly there you find yourself in total, deep awe.

The real challenge, uncannily, is the stress of the peer pressure you’re immersed in. When you’re trekking uphill and you start to tremble, your body is aching, your legs are begging for rest, you feel stressed because somehow you are forced to keep going because your partners look like taking a walk in the park, almost literally, and you don’t want to slow down the group just because every step demands huge physical effort. It’s not fun anymore. 

To top it all off, your brain also decides to assist by questioning whether the trip was really a good idea or not. I felt all of this last month when UrbanTrekkers invited me on a hiking adventure, I quickly realized it was going to be a challenge.

I felt very tired, the sun was draining my energy, I was reaching my limit, but I didn't stop because I thought I could still hold on a little longer. Until I got to a point where I noticed that it was impossible for me to breathe and my legs started to hurt even more. I was sweating a lot and I started to feel dizzy. 

And yet, you feel so vulnerable and guilty at the same time because you do not want others to see your feebleness because you’ll feel judged for being weak since no one else had said that they were tired. I didn’t want to be the only one who stops to rest!

I couldn’t take it anymore, even if I had to wail it out or ask an innocent question, I decided to discuss it with others. I took a shot. My pain was bigger than my ego. To my surprise, I was overwhelmed with support, understanding and the rest made me regain the strength to continue with the journey. That moment of sincerity changed the whole panorama and I was able to finish the trek to the top of the mountain.

Sometimes we can show our vulnerable side and there will always be someone to listen and help us. Having to slow the group down or just resting should never be a second-guessed option if you have true, nice people by your side. Whether they are your friends or some strangers you just happen to meet, we have to remind ourselves: being vulnerable is OK.