Want to know about him? We’ve got the scoop on this ARCC Leader!

• Name: Nolan Wildfire
• Age: 25
• Schools attended & Degree: Elon University- Education, University of Tennessee: Higher Education
• Hometown: Pittsburgh, PA                                                                             
• What ARCC trips have you led: Alaska, Ecuador/Galapagos
• What ARCC trip did you go on/would you go on if you were a student? Alaska is life changing! Go there now!
• If you could meet anyone (living or dead) who would it be? Frank Sinatra
• Mountains or Beach? Mountains
• Item you would bring on survivor? Bear Grylls
• Essential travel item? Dr. Brommers Soap
• Favorite piece of clothing? Vibram 5 Fingers
• Sport you played in High School? Volleyball, Cross Country, Basketball
• Favorite Book? Where the Old Fern Grows
• What song would you sing on American Idol? Build me a Buttercup
• What would the title of your biography be? Cheese, Wedgies and the Finer Things In Life
• Favorite condiment? Heinz Ketchup
• What did you dislike about yourself when you were young and now love? Long Legs- I looked gangly
• What food could you eat for the rest of your life? Colby Cheese
• What is your best summer memory? Snorkling with seals in the Galapagos
• Longest you have been without a shower? 3 weeks, STANKY!
• What is one thing that you wish you knew when you were in High School? Girls are trouble!
• What was your first job? lifeguard
• If you had to move to another country, where would you move? Chile

Another of our 2011 ARCC Leaders, Toby Cohen, shares some fun factoids!

• Name: Toby Cohen
• Age: 25
• Schools attended & Degree: The Colorado College-BA History/Poli-Sci Minor: Education
• Hometown: Andover, MA
• What ARCC trips have you led: Africa Service, Costa Rica Service, Turkey/Greece Service
• What ARCC trip did you go on/would you go on if you were a student? Thailand
• If you could meet anyone (living or dead) who would it be? MLK Jr.
• Mountains or Beach? Mountains
• Item you would bring on survivor? iPod Shuffle
• Essential travel item? Baby Wipes
• Favorite piece of clothing? Boat Shoes
• Sport you played in High School? Hockey+ Lacrosse
• Favorite Book? Choke
• What song would you sing on American Idol? Mr. Big- Just to be the next to be with you
• What would the title of your biography be? I’m comfortable if you are.
• Favorite condiment? BBQ Sauce
• What did you dislike about yourself when you were young and now love? My smile
• What food could you eat for the rest of your life? Skittles
• What is your best summer memory? Summer Camp at Camp Young Judea
• Longest you have been without a shower? 3 weeks
• What is one thing that you wish you knew when you were in High School? That it goes by fast!
• What was your first job? Camp Councelor
• If you had to move to another country, where would you move? Barcelona, Spain

Learn more about ARCC Leader Andrea Holm!

• Name: Andrea Holm
• Age: 31
• Schools attended & Degree: University of Navarra- Masters of Education, University of Iowa- BS in Recreation Administration
• Hometown:  Bloomington, MN                                                                     
• What ARCC trips have you led: Blue Water Virgin Islands, Costa Rica Multisport, Cost Rica Service 2 week, Costa Rica Service 3 week
• What ARCC trip did you go on/would you go on if you were a student? Africa Global Action Wildlife Studies
• If you could meet anyone (living or dead) who would it be? Michael Jackson
• Mountains or Beach? Beach
• Item you would bring on survivor? Tooth brush
• Essential travel item? Tooth brush and an ability to adapt
• Favorite piece of clothing? Every zip up hoody I own
• Sport you played in High School? Track and field (400m), Ski Team, Cross Country Running, Soccer
• Favorite Book? Revolutionary Rd
• What song would you sing on American Idol? I can’t sing at all. But maybe “I Think Were alone now” by Tiffany
• What would the title of your biography be? One day I will be a wise old lady!
• Favorite condiment?  Dijon Mustard
• What did you dislike about yourself when you were young and now love?  Gangliness maybe? Being so tall
• What food could you eat for the rest of your life? Grapefruit, cottage cheese
• What is your best summer memory? As a kid- camping with my family in Northern, MN
• Longest you have been without a shower? 1 week
• What is one thing that you wish you knew when you were in High School? That High School is not the best days of your life as people sometimes say! It gets so much better!
• What was your first job?  Dairy Queen
• If you had to move to another country, where would you move? Mexico

Here in the ARCC office it is officially SUMMER! We may go by a different schedule than the rest of the world. Yesterday we welcomed three of our leaders who are leaving for China, TODAY.

Seasoned leaders, Sophia W, David M, and Pete R, spent all day getting equipment, making journals, going over all the details of their upcoming trip with Pacific Ridge to China. The three will fly to China today and meet up with Max C. who will also be leading our first summer trip. The group will have one week to further prepare before meeting the Pac Ridge students and teachers!

Goodbye to our China leaders and Hello to SUMMER!

Well the journey is quickly coming to a close – we are have the next two nights in Beijing and have realized that it is not nearly enough time to see and do all that the city has to offer.  Our plan is to do what the ARCC students do in 2.5 days in about half that time – I think we can do it.  We’ll be on a whirlwind tour of Beijing – seeing the parks and Tiananmen square in the early hours (hope to catch the flag raising) the spend the day at the Great Wall and the rest of the time checking out the hotels/restaurants for the groups.  Will be a busy schedule but then we have a 12 hour flight to sleep on!

Here are some pictures from our time in Shangri-La and Tibet….stories to follow when there is more time.  I am not usually a plane photo-taker, but the views flying to/from Lhasa were incredible….as you can see.

It’s true when they say the food in China is not the same as Chinese food that we are used to eating in the US.  I admittedly was nervous about this before heading over to China, as I am one who really enjoys food and did not really know what to expect – all of those concerns were quickly laid to rest as I have had some amazing food all over China. A few highlights include:

• Steamed dumplings for breakfast – filled with veggies and egg…. like a breakfast burrito but Chinese style, yum!
• Just about every type of vegetable dish you can imagine – spicy shitake mushrooms with eggplant, tofu with tomato, egg with tomato, spicy snow peas
• Fried rice – one of my favorites in the states…is way better here!
• Fresh Walnut bread (sort of like a Dunkin Donut munchkin with a walnut inside)
• Lots of pickled vegetables – they are super healthy (good for digestion) and people here eat them with most meals

I could probably write about food all day – but I am off to visit some parts of Shangri La – the Tibetan area in the southwest.  Here our students will work to help a small village in Napa Lake to create the tourism infrastructure they need in order to give the local families a source of income.  These families don’t have much in the way of land so they are not able to grow their own food or make money from the land, so the hope for the village is to make it an environmental protected area that attracts tourists (mostly on bicycle).   

One other quick note about the Tiger Leaping Gorge hike – it is AMAZING!  Some of the most scenic views I have seen in my lifetime.  See some photos from the hike.

The journey to Zhaoxing from Chengyang Dong was an incredible drive through the mountains  – passing villages so small that if I had even closed my eyes for a moment I would not have known that we passed by another one.   Despite it seeming like we were in a place where few people lived, there were always people working in the fields each time I looked out the window – if not working they were walking to work, carrying buckets of water, bundles of freshly harvested vegetables and a metal tool with which they do their work.  Often the heavy loads were precariously balancing on a large pole over their shoulder.  The work ethic here is strong and even in the rainy conditions people were outside doing the day’s work – which also seemed to involve a long walk from their village.

The quaint Dong village town of Zhaoxing is a maze of small streets and walkways, each alleyway with vibrant colors of artisan crafts or a vendor selling their delicacy. The small village is surrounded by a number of even smaller villages and I was thrilled to have the chance to visit several schools to determine where our service work is most needed this summer.  In June, our Pacific Ridge students will be working on building part of a playground for a primary school in the mountains; we will also be planting trees in the schoolyard.  Of course the students will also be helping the local students with their English through lessons, games and activities.  I have no doubt that the students will be a huge hit for the kids – they were very excited to meet me and of course wanted their pictures taken, this time they were not as interested in having me in the picture, they just liked to pose for the camera and then immediately come running over to see the digital image on the screen. 

Our time in the small village was somewhat limited as we had to get to Yangshou and explore all that this charming town has to offer.  The amazing landscape here is full of huge rock formations jutting out from the land, there are several rivers that intersect and the scene is really quite breathtaking. 

Off to the Yunnan Province…next update to include details on the culinary differences in the regions I have visited, and perhaps some insights into my favorite foods thus far (I think it will be hard to choose – lots of great food here!)

In Chengyang Dong I got my first glimpse at what life as a celebrity must be like, more on that in a moment.  Michael and I spent the early part of the afternoon walking around and exploring the villages surrounding his home village – there are 8 different villages that make up the area where he lives.  Each village has about 1000 people living in it and all of the people are from the Dong Minority – I noticed Michael talking with the other villagers in a different type of tone and assumed that it was a dialect to the region, however I was then informed that it is actually an entire different language  – called Dong language, Michael speaks this, Mandarin and English! 

The Dong people have many of their own traditions and customs including all of the weddings of the village taking place over the course of 5 days, starting on the last day of the year and concluding on the 4^th day of the new year.   Each wedding lasts for the duration of the 5 days and includes many different celebrations, animal offerings, processions and traditional song and dance.  Sounds like an incredible time to visit and Michael invited me to come back to witness this sometime in the future – I hope I am able to take him up on that someday.

Okay, so back to being a celebrity – we made our way to the Drom Tower in the village, which is the central meeting square and a symbol of the Dong people.    Michael had told me we were going to see a dance – at the square were many of the local people dressed in their traditional attire and carrying traditional wooden instruments, at first it seemed as though I was the only one there for the dance, but then a group of students from outside of Shanghai arrived.  The dance began with beautiful music and fluid movement and when the people stopped to take a break, the students slowly moved closer to me, saying “hello” “how are you?” and other basic English phrases.  As I responded and smiled one young girl pulled out her camera and asked to take a picture with me, I said of course and before I knew it,  about 20 cameras were out and each student was running in to be in the picture.  It was quite the scene that lasted for the next several minutes and at each break in the dance that followed.  I gave my camera to a student to be included in the hype – you can see the excitement in all of us in the photos.  After the dance concluded and we continued walking around the villages, I was consistenty greeted with “hello” and a smile or a giggle.    Okay so maybe celebrity-dom is a little different than that, but it sure felt like it for a few minutes!

See the photos!

One of our ARCC staffers, Ellery, is off on an adventure in China.  She reports in for us below!

I have made it out of the hectic Chinese cities and into the countryside – it is beautiful!  Our day started out with a 4 hour drive from Guilin (I had flown there last night from Shanghai) to Chengyang Dong – the home village of our local guide Michael.  Michael is great – he is filled with knowledge about China and especially his home province Guangxi.  The drive through the mountains was incredible – with terraced rice fields abound – the fog settling over the hills made it similar to the postcard you always imagine from this rice farming part of the world. I have learned a few things about rice so far in my travels.

Turns out – not everything planted in those terraces is rice!  There is actually a significant amount of green tea as well.  The rice requires a lot of water and not all of the areas are able to produce as much as is necessary so they have found another crop that works well in that environment. In addition to being a tour guide, Michael is a rice farmer as well as the owner of the guesthouse where our groups will stay this summer. When asking him about his rice production he says that they only sell a small amount of the rice they produce, knowing that he has a lot of land, I was surprised and asked him why.  His answer was that the rice is mostly for his family – he said the average per person consumption of rice is half a kilo per day – that is over a pound of rice per person per day!  I am not sure that I have reached that intake yet, but with rice porridge for breakfast and rice for lunch, I think I am getting close…we shall see. 

View from Ellery's hotel in China

The last three days the Chinese people celebrated the Qing Ming which is the day to remember the ancestors who have passed on. There are many different traditions associated with this holiday including the burining of paper artifacts made to resemble real life  items, such as money, computers, food, etc. Picture little replicas made out of lightweight cardboard.  The sentiment is that by making this offering, the spirit of those who have passed on will be able to enjoy these items in the afterlife. There are also a lot of firecrackers that go off when burning these items.  We saw many people on the hillside doing just that – it was a nice way to remember the importance of honoring those who have passed on, regardless of the way in which it is done.

Next stop in the village is to meet the students who we will teach English to this summer – will share stories from the introduction and hopefully pictures soon.

Spring is on its way, and for many, high school graduation is right around the corner.  Most graduates are preparing for college but others are following a different path.  A “GAP” year is an increasingly popular way for students to gain valuable real-world experiences between between high school and college.  As a leader in student travel, Adventures Cross-Country (ARCC) today announced its newest programs, GAP Semesters in Africa and Asia.

A common practice in other countries for years, the GAP concept is now finding popularity in the United States.  A recent survey of 300,000 freshmen at four-year colleges revealed that 1.2 percent waited a year to enter college, according to the Higher Education Research Institute at the University of California at Los Angeles.

“Our GAP programs have a rich academic fabric complementing each location. We don’t want parents or students to think of this as a vacation. It is an educational, life-changing adventure filled with discovery and hard work,” commented Scott von Eschen, President of Adventures Cross-Country.

Students interested in ARCC’s GAP Semesters will travel on programs in Africa and Asia.  GAP Africa explores the majesty, cultures, and challenges of three East African nations: Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania.  GAP Asia is a unique blend of education, service and exploration of the intriguing and ancient cultures of Thailand, China and Tibet.

ARCC’s GAP Semester programs offer an educational and cultural bridge between high school and college. They are an opportunity to live, work, learn and explore in some of the greatest classrooms on earth. The programs examine five essential themes: Literacy & Education, Public Health, Urbanization & the Movement of Peoples, Environment & Conservation, and Microfinance & Economic Growth.

ARCC’s GAP Semester program is open to students finishing 12^th grade in 2011.   Visit www.adventurescrosscountry.com for more information.  Registration for 2011 GAP Semester programs is now open.