Sometimes my roses hurt.

We met with three organizations today, including Fairfund, Free the Slaves, and Stop Modern day Slavery. We experienced many things, and learned a lot.

Roses and thorns is a crazy thing that Mara invented in which everyone in the group describes a rose(good thing) and a thorn(bad thing) that happened to them that given day.

Here is a synopsis:

roses:
1. We learned that people holding full time positions can indeed fight modern day slavery. This was exhibited by the extraordinary people that volunteer for Stop Modern Day Slavery. These people donate their free time to fight.
2.The weather was great. Dupont circle was popping. We met with Fairfund to discuss their initiative and to help advocate the new DC legislation on human trafficking. While we were casually sitting on the fountain located in the middle of Dupont, we were awestruck when a raid of about 50 cops swarmed around us, thinking we were about to protest. Nevertheless, we proceeded to handout flyer's.
3. We ate lots of ice cream today. Not only did some of us purchase frozen treats from Ben and Jerry's, we also had an ice cream party after the meeting with Stop Modern Day slavery. During the ice cream party, the group bonded and a sense of community was officially established. YUM!
4. Handing out flyer's was eye opening. It was the first time on this trip where we could be hands on. Many of us were against the "powerpoint lectures" that we had been seeing throughout this week, but today was an opportunity that forced us to get deep into the issue of change.
"Education is the first step towards advocacy, advocacy is the first step towards change, and change is the last step towards freedom (Miguel, 2010)."

Thorns:
1.One of the thorns of today, involved the Sun's ultraviolet rays, and the subsequent destruction of some of our member's skin. This occured while we were working in Dupont. Hopefully we will get some sun screen before we continue with this work manana (spanish).
2.I thought people were nice until I met this man on the block of Dupont. I proceeded to educate him about the severity of Human Traffiking. I approached him, tense and anxious.... and said " Yo, whats up man."
He responded, " Get out of my face." and continued on his way.
You might think I'm trying to be funny, but this situation elucidates the ignorance that our communities contain. We sit here, unthankful for the food we eat, the beds we sleep on and the family we talk to. We are unaware of our surroundings, unaware of the problems that millions around the world face, but yet we sit here, sheltering ourselves from the misfortunes of others.
3. Another thorn of the day was when our group was walking home from the meeting with Stop Modern Slavery. When we were reaching the U street metro stop we witnessed a gentlemen collapse to the ground. Members of our group immediately rushed to his aid, and tried to communicate with the man, but he was obviosuly experiencing a lot of pain and was in serious danger. This was a scary situation and it greatly retracted from the happiness of the group. A policeman eventually arrived and took control of the situation, and our group dispersed after a couple more moments of helping out. The care demonstrated by our group was admirable, but we understood when it was time for us to leave to make way for the professionals.
4. Its wednesday, which means we only have 2 more full days. That is really unfortunate. We are establishing a great bond with eachother. We feel like a family. And the trip is almost over...blown. Back to reality, back to school, back to CP, back to exams, back to our boring lives.

But on the BRIGHT SIDE.. we are Aware.

-Zan and Christian.