Birgit Winther, Up with People, 11th July - 16th Dec. 2008

Manila part 2

2008-12-08T04:36:00.000-08:00

Manila part 2:

"family-picture"

With the German and Swedish

In the slum

With my cummunity-partner

eating, eating, eating... ;-)

In the slum

In the Mall

With Michelle and her friend in the slum

eating again ;-), in a province of Manila

shopping, shopping ... ;-)

My community-partner and her sister

At home singing karaoke

Manila was the best experience of the whole UWP-trip so far!!!! We had soooooo much fun

:-)!!!!!!

Now we are in Subic!!

See you!!!

Birgit ;-)

Manila, Philippines

2008-11-24T00:22:00.000-08:00

Manila, Philippines:
Doing CI work in the slum.
Some photos... will put on more soon!
We are having a very good time here!!!! :-)

North Platte, Nebraska USA

2008-11-16T12:22:00.000-08:00

North Platte, Nebraska USA:

On the way from Sioux Falls to North Platte was quite a bit of snow!

Our staff made/ played the "North Platte Canteen" for us:

Community work at the animals shelter in North Platte:

Dave's birthday:

School Project:

Visiting the railway system in North Platte:

Staff Appritiation day:

We had our 2 final USA-shows this week!!:

My hostfamily this week:

Last time doing strike (pull down the stage)!! Yeah!! :-) In the Philippines somebody else will doing that for us!

Also my hostfamily ;-)!!:

In a few hours we are leaving for the Philippines!!!! How exciting!!! Unfortunately, Gwen, Kirk and Cathrine can't come with us to the Philippines :-(((!!

Byeeeee for now!!!

Birgit ;-)

Sioux Falls, South Dakota (USA)

2008-11-07T18:59:00.000-08:00

Sioux Falls, South Dakota (USA):

On Monday we went to a High School Football game:

Promoting our show:

At the waterfalls of the River Sioux:

Doing community work at the Volunteers of America:

We are also getting ready for the Philippines!! We are all very excited to go there soon!! :-)

Bye the way, here it's been freezing cold this week! We even have snow now!

Greetings to all of you!!!

Birgit ;-)

Cheyenne & Aberdeen (USA)

2008-11-01T13:38:00.000-07:00

Cheyenne:

Aberdeen, South Dakota:

Salt Lake City, USA

2008-10-19T19:59:00.000-07:00

Salt Lake City:

We went to the Mormon headquarters, we did CI-work at the Foodbank, we did the "Stand for Peace -Project at the elementary school, our staff had a surprise-show for us (Cast B appriciation day), we had our own show at Murray highschool, where also a part of "Highschool Musical" had been filmed! We went to the Mormon-church, we had a BBQ at friends' house... We are very busy all the time!! :-)

Greetings, Birgit ;-)

Albuquerque, Colorado Springs

2008-10-15T19:43:00.000-07:00

Albuquerque:

Colorado Springs:

Hermosillo Mexico, Sahuarita Arizona USA

2008-09-28T21:58:00.001-07:00

Hermosillo (Mexico):

Sahuarita, Arizona, USA:

Culiacan, Mexico, 14th September 2008

2008-09-14T21:56:00.000-07:00

Breckenridge (USA), La Paz (Mexico), Cabo San Lucas (Mexico), Tepic (Mexico)

2008-09-10T22:33:00.000-07:00

Tepic (Mexico):

Cabo San Lucas (Mexico):

La Paz (Mexico):

Breckenridge (USA):

Breckenridge, 12th August 2008

2008-08-12T20:33:00.000-07:00

Hi there!!! :-)

Yesterday we arrived in our new town Breckenridge!! Here it looks like in Switzerland!!! It's a very touristic place, especially in winter many people come here for skiing! It's beautiful here :-)!!!!!!! A shame that we'll just stay here until 15th August!
My new hostfamily is Mark and Tracy Burke with daughter Ashley (16) and sons Jeff and James (both of them don't live here at the moment. And a dog again! She's called Roxy and is 8 years old, very cute ;-)! Mrak and Tracy own a Irish Pub, very cool :-)!!! We'll have dinner there tomorrow night!
My room-mates are Cheryssa (USA) and Eriko (Japan). We live in a lovely house with a nice view to the mountains (it's really like in Switzerland)!

Today we did community impact work. I was crew leader of the group which went to the Summit Highschool painting the walls in the cafeteria, which was great fun!

Tomorow I'll be crew leader with the group which will go the elemantary school for community impact!

On Thursday we'll have our second show here in Breckenridge!

Next week we'll be in Mexico!! How exciting!! :-)

By the way, our tour schedule has changed a bit. Here the new dates and places:

Breckenridge, CO 11 - 15 August

Mexico:
La Paz, 16-22 August
Sahuarita, Green Valley, 22 - 29 August
Albuquerque, New Mexico, 29 Sep.-8 October

USA:
Colorado Springs, Ft. Carson Colorado, 8 - 13 October
Salt Lake City, Utah, 13-20 October
Casper. Wyoming, 20-27 October
Aberdeen, South Dakota, 27 October - 3 November
Sioux Falls, South Dakota, 3-10 November
North Platte, Nebraska , 10-17 November

Philippines:
Manila, 17 Nov.-5th December
Subic Bay, 5-16 December

-> Flight back to Germany (Frankfurt).

Byyyye for now!!!!!!
Birgit ;-)

Some more News about my last few days, Boulder, Monday 4th August

2008-08-03T09:57:00.002-07:00

Tuesday, 29th July:

On Tuesday we did community impact work at a place in the Rocky Mountains where there was a huge forest fire in 2002. We planted 100 trees!!! It was fun!! :-)

Thursday, 31rd July:

Another night at Kirk' s house having BBQ! Brittany (USA), Annika (Germany), Stewart (USA), Ben (USA) and Sack (USA) came too!

Friday, 1st August:

Sometimes we play games at home in the evenings!

....

I have so many nice pictures, and so much more to tell you, however, somehow this blog-thing doesn't work at the moment :-(! Can't upload pictures, very strange....

Well, bye for now! Am so exhausted, should sleep more ;-)!

Birgit ;-)

News from Boulder (Denver), Sunday 3rd August 2008

2008-08-03T09:57:00.000-07:00

Hello friends, family... :-)!!! Hope you are doing well!!

Have been soooo busy!!! Have a lot to tell you!!

Tuesday, 22nd July:

Leaders from different companies around Denver came to our UWP-place for discussions about leadership. We talked what about "leadership" includes, and how we can be a leader.

In the evening Lilli came to our house for dinner. Bob and Judy have invited her. Lilli is half German, half American. She works in a bakery in Boulder, where they make German bread. She can speak German, that' s why she wanted to speak in German with me. After dinner we went for a walk, which was nice.

Thursday, 24th July:
There was a Jazz-concert in the mall in Denver. Franziska, Marion (both Swiss), Jacky (American), Eduardo (Mexico), Raffael... and some staff-members were also there. We had a nice chat!

Marion and Franziska:

Friday, 25th July:

In the evening Kirk came to our house in Boulder, we made our "Me-pages" for UWP:

Saturday, 26th July:

That morning we had to leave our house at 6:00! We went wildwater-rafting in the Rocky Mountains, which was great fun :-)!!!! Bob had organised this trip for all UWP-people and their hostfamilies!

Before our wildwater-rafting:

We were for about 3 hours on the river:

After the wildwater-rafting. All exhausted and happy:
After the wildwater-rafting Bob showed us (Brittany, Kirk & me) around:

A wild river:

Brittany & Kirk in love!!!! :-) :

High mountains:

A nice lake:

A lovely old town, where we had dinner:
Sunday, 27th July:

Bob and Judy took us to Adam's birthday-party. Adam is their grandson, who is 10 years old now!

Ready to go (with all the presents):

Adam:

20thJuly Denver

2008-07-15T19:16:00.001-07:00

Hello ;-)!!!!

We've had a very busy week! A lot of rehearsals for dancing and singing!!

On Wednesday evening was our culture jam! Gwen (Swiss) and I sang "S'isch mer alles eis Ding'! We did quite well, even though we'd been quite nervous singing (with some movements) in front of sooo many people! Also all the hostfamilies came watching us!

On Thursday evening Kirk (from Denver) took us out to a Baseball-game, which was great fun!

Yesterday evening Kirk invited us (me and Brittany) to his house for BBQ, which was very tasty!!

Swiss chocolate fondue with strawberries, lovely ;-)!!!!

Tonight Judy is taking us out for a pizza at the Chicago Restaurant! Bob is not here at the moment. He went mountain-climbing and riverrafting with some highschool-students somewhere in the Rocky Mountains. Tomorrow (Monday) he'll be back home.

By the way, here some pictures of Bob & Judy's house in Boulder:

Here our room:

The living-room with kitchen etc:

A nice garden:

Bye for now!!!! Birgit ;-)

First Weekend in Denver

2008-07-15T19:16:00.000-07:00

Hi there :-)!!!!!!

I'm doing well here in the USA!!! Have finally received my luggage, which was almost 3 days delayed!

My hostfamily is Bob & Judy Rothe from Boulder (near Denver)! They have a lovely dog and a nice house. Am staying in this family together with Brittany from USA.

The first weekend was just a family-weekend. Bob and Judy showed us around a lot, which was very kind of them. So we went to a Railway Museum, where Bob usually works as a volunteer. You must know, he's a big railway-fan.

On the way to that museum we even saw many cows, which was very exciting. Some of you will think now: " Has she gone to the USA for seeing cows?? Aren't there not enough cows in Switzerland?" ;-))) Well, it was quite exciting because there were some "cowboys" riding beside of them on their horse as well. What's more, they even had to cross a railway-track, which was not easy as many trains were passing there...

Besides, on Sunday we joint Bob and Judy to church. It's always intersting to see what is it like in in churches in other countries. Afterwards they took us out for a lovely lunch in a restaurant (chicken on a tasty orange-sauce, hmmm :-)!!)

On Moday was our first day with Up with People in Denver. We played many games to brake the ice between the participants (96 participants form 22 countries plus the staff). We also had some theory about how a group works and how people communicate with each other etc... And the staff showed us some different parts of the Up with People Show.

All this program takes place in a big building in Denver. Every day we have to take the bus from Boulder to Denver, which takes about 50 minutes (time for learning the song lyrics, sleeping ;-) etc..). Every day we have a program from 8.30 to 17.30. Then we mostly go home and have dinner with our hostfamily and spend the evening with them.

Today's program was: We had to take part into different moduls (speaking, singing & show-costumes). Futhermore, several ex-participants of Up with People came to Denver for talking to us and answering questions we had.

Tomorrow we are going to have the modul "dancing". And later in the afternoon some information about different cultures and some physical excersices (we sweat a lot here!!!).

And in the evening we are going to have our culture jam, when also the hostfamilies arecoming and watching us. Am going to sing a Swiss song together with Gwen from Switzerland! Am already getting nervous when i think about that :-/! Hope I will manage that on stage in front of all those people!!

Tomorrow is also the day when Bob (our hostfather) is coming to Up with People announcing his riverraft-trips! He always takes people out riverrafting in the Rocky Mountains!

Well, have finally got over my jet-leg and can enjoy life here! :-)

Bye for now!!

Birgit ;-)

July 2008 Travel Schedule

2008-07-06T02:34:00.001-07:00

United States:
Denver, CO (orientation), 11 July - 11 August

United States:
Pueblo, CO, 11 August - 18 August

Mexico:
San Jose del Cabo, 18 August - 25 August
La Paz, 25 August - 1 September
Tepic, 1 September - 8 September
Guadalajara, 8 September - 15 September
Hermosillo, 15 September - 22 September

United States:
Nogales, AZ, 22 September - 29 September
Albuquerque, NM, 29 September - 6 October
Durango, CO, 6 October - 13 October
Provo, UT, 13 October - 20 October
Jackson Hole, WY, 20 October - 27 October
Sioux Falls, SD, 27 October - 3 November
Waukesha, WI, 3 November - 10 November
Peoria, IL, 10 November - 17 November

Philippines:
Manila, 17 November - 1 December
Subic Bay, 1 December - 8 December
Cebu, 8 December - 15 December
Manila, 15 December - 16 December

-> Back to Europe! End of tour!

Getting ready for an exciting journey with UWP

2008-06-22T03:09:00.000-07:00

Hello to all of you!!! :-)
Soon it`ll be 11th July when my journey with Up with People will start! We are going to travel around in USA, Mexico and Philippines! Am already excited and am looking forward to that new experience!
So, that means that I`m very busy at the moment with finishing my work at school, saying goodbye to friends and buying clothes (for the show) etc. for my journey...

I have opened this blog for you! So you can join me a bit on my journey and I hopefully will be able to update you from time to time!

I`ll probably write in English (will give my best not to make too many mistakes ;-)!)! Otherwise it`ll be a bit difficult for my non-German-speaking friends to read my messages ;-)! (Greetings to England, Sweden, Japan... ;-)!)

If you want to have some more information about Up with People, have a look here: http://www.upwithpeople.org/

Bye for now!!!
Birgit ;-)