Keep Moving Forward

Today, I woke up to the kangaroo song… “When kangaroo’s wake up in the morning they always say good day, when kangaroo’s wake up in the morning they always say good day, bounce, bounce, bounce, bounce, bounce is what they say!” Our facilitators like to keep things interesting. Following breakfast, we had a talk with Krista Wright about Polar Bears International and all the different resources they have available to us for support. Then, the teens had the awesome opportunity to have a live video conference with Olivia’s school in Memphis, Tennessee. They asked a variety of questions that we know will be asked when we return home, so it was a good opportunity to practice how to answer because some were pretty tough (such as, “What do you tell people who don’t think global warming is real or human induced?”). When the conference ended, Chris had a powerpoint to share about leadership, which lead to deep and personal discussions about why we were here and what this trip meant for us. This was very important to me and the group as well because we all feel that we came closer together today. I don’t even want to think about having to say goodbye to the wonderful people I have met on this trip. So, after the discussions we a talk with Emily Goldstein who is an amazing person. She is a past Project Polar Bear winner, and she still is going out and giving presentations about polar bears and climate change. The group talked to her about some concerns we had with had with public speaking events and more. Proceeding our talk with Emily, each teen took turns sharing with the group our own ideas for our personal forward actions plans. These plans are the actions we are going to take in our communities once we return home. I personally loved hearing about everyone’s ideas and how excited everyone was about their plans! This was a very long process, but we made it through. Before we knew it, my team was called for kitchen duties! I am now confident in my ability to dry dishes efficiently. After dinner, Kathryn Foat talked to everyone about Acres for the Atomosphere, and we had a live chat with a polar bear keeper from North Carolina about her participation in that program.

That is my day up until now, everyone is currently blogging and having a little “down time” in the lounge. There are things to do though, so I will blog again tomorrow!  Be sure to check out our group blogs at the link from my last post.