During spring break I traveled to Cairo Illinois with an outlet from my church. Cairo Illinois is a very poverty stricken community that was nominated for a "mission trip reboot". During this mission trip reboot our goal was to be able to help rebuild, repaint and clean up many of the houses around the town. My group, consisting of a total of 9 people (including myself) was broken down into two groups upon arriving in Cairo and we were assigned to help out with the two main projects that we being worked on while we were there (the first "main project" was the rebuilding of a church that had burnt down last year, and the second "main project" was to scrape and repaint random townhouses that had been taken over with mold and become unlivable to the people in its community--I was placed in the group that would be scraping and repainting the random townhouses due to the fact that I have back problems and would not be much help lifting all of the wood that was needed to rebuild the church.)
We were in Cairo Illinois for a total of four days, and spent a full day's work (8 hours) each day cleaning, scraping and repainting as many town houses as we could while we were there. While we were there we finished a total of two houses and had started on the third one before it was time to leave. I personally spent most of my days on a ladder wiping down the surfaces after they had been cleaned of mold and prepping the inside and outside walls for paint. I was also in charge of scraping off the old paint from the outside of the house while some of the others we assigned to scrap away the mold that was mostly on the shaded side of the house.
We completely transformed these two houses. Not only did we completely gut all of the mold and water damage that had been done to the houses over the years, but with a team of 25 of us per house working to get it all done, we managed to clean, sanitize, and repaint every wall inside and outside of the house. The first house went from being a white, mold covered, stinky, smelly house that reaked of stale water, to being a clean, sunny pale yellow house with light brown shutters. The second house started out in pretty much the same condition as the first house, except this house was a double wide tailor instead of a regular paneled house, in which, after scraping and removing the mold, was in good enough condition that the paint job was left the same on the outside. We did however repaint the inside walls of this tailor all white and managed to cover up a hideous floral print that was in their bathroom. :) Overall, these two houses looked completely brand new once we had gotten finished with them.
Also, not only were we given time to work on repairing the community dwellings, but we were also given time to interact with the children that lived in Cairo as well... and let me tell you, these were the most kind, happy and playful children that I have ever met. When I first came to Cairo, looking around I would have assumed that these children would be a little bit tamer, a little bit sadder, more depressed, but in all reality it was the exact opposite. These children loved all the attention they were getting from having so many new faces in their town and living in their school for the week that it was unbelievable. They kept asking younger people for piggy back ride and wanting to play hopscotch and even wanting to come to the work sites with us--which they weren't allowed to do because of the danger involved and the fact that many of these children ran around without shoes on. These children had no preference for any particular one of us and the fact that we had statistically increased their Caucasian population by 100% while we were there seemed to have no affect on their either. These children were blinded by anything but pure love and appreciation for us--which made being their completely worth it.
All in all I believe that this trip was the best thing that I have ever done. It gave me a sense of accomplishment and allowed myself to give selflessly to others, while expecting nothing in return. I had been raising money all year with my church in order to help my group come up with the money to be able to travel to Cairo and the feeling of giving in itself made all the struggles worth it.
Not only was I given a chance to network and learn more about getting involved in the charitable work field, but I was also given an opportunity to actively help those in need. I just sit back now and think to myself.. what would those children's life be like if our, or any of the other mission trip reboots had decided to go to another location? What would the conditions that they were living in do to those people? What would the children be like? What would their overall town be like if we hadn't stepped in? I shudder at the thought of my answers. This community was brought back together by all of out hard work and I am happy to say that those people will undoubtedly live happier, healthier lives now that they have their homes and church back.
The most relevant concept that I have learned by taking this Disadvantaged Family class, in which could be applied to what I learned while on this mission trip reboot, would be to "assume diversity and never place stereotypes." The reason I believe that this is the most applied concept that I could apply is because of the children I encountered. As I have said in my previous paragraph, by looking around the town and seeing how much despair the people whom are living here should be in, and then connecting that to how the children had acted--worlds of differences were shown. Not only were these children the exact opposite as to what I had thought they would be in my mind, but their complete re guard for passion and acceptance was utterly remarkable. I love the fact that regardless of what their home life was like, or what troubles they were facing at home they still appreciated every single one of us for being there and genuinely acted as if they wanted to be our friends.
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