On Saturday I got to help out at Denver's Gorilla Run - an annual 5K that raises funds for a nonprofit that protects an endangered species of gorillas. All the runners wore gorilla suits, so it was pretty entertaining to watch! It was a Guinness World Record Breaking event - most people wearing gorilla suits in one place. It breaks its own record every year!
I didn't get many great pictures at the Gorilla Run, but I hope this gives you some idea of what it was like. This is just a small piece of the starting line up!
On Sunday I got to assist at Halloween Street, an annual event at the Denver Children's Museum. The best costume I saw was a little baby Snow White whose parents were two of the dwarves. I helped out outside for the majority of the event, but I heard that the inside of the museum is pretty great. I wished that I would have gotten to interact with the kids more; I was mostly gate security. Oh well.Early Monday morning I got to do an ISP with Denver Rescue Mission, serving breakfast at their downtown location. I really recommend it, it's been my favorite ISP so far. It was short, but the staff was really friendly and the work was rewarding. Together, we served 206 people breakfast that morning. We got back right in time to meet with our teams and start our day.
Fire 1 spent a long time getting to know each other that day. We worked on our team charter, some guidelines we all agreed upon to help our year go smoothly. We also discussed team roles. So far I am the Service Learning Initiator (SLI) and Birthday Point of Contact (BPOC). The Birthday POC isn't a serious require team role, just one of the fun, optional ones. But I'm really excited to do it! I packed birthday candles in my suitcase. I also might end up being one of the ISP Coordinators to help my team continue to earn their ISP hours while on spike. I'll learn a lot more about these team roles tomorrow in some in-depth training. Later that Monday, Fire 1 had some fun and toured an amazing candy factory called Hammonds. Not great timing because our PT baselines occured that afternoon and we felt a little slugglish from all the sweets, but it was so worth it!
A partial picture of Fire 1 at the candy factory! From left, standing: Arthur, me, Erin, Meghan, Lalita, Conor, Lani. From left, crouching: Bruce, Nadav. It's not our real team picture because John and Tobin were sick that day, and since that day Arthur has left the program. =( Hopefully we'll get an official full team picture soon!
PT is going great so far. It is just the right level of difficulty that I feel challenged but not overwhelmed. The coordinators try to make it fun and interesting; we do a lot of team sports and games and change locations often. I already feel like I'm getting stronger and healthier. On Tuesday we had Shelter Management training with the Red Cross. It was a long morning, but full of really valuable information. Disaster relief is NCCC's first priority, and NCCC has responded to almost every nationally recognized disaster since it was formed in 1994. Often NCCC partners with the American Red Cross in doing so, doing everything from case work with families to organizing donations to mucking out and rebuilding homes. In the past, some corps members have ended up being workers and managers of shelters in the disaster affected areas, so it was really important that we all learn the basics.
Speaking of disasters, there is little to no chance that I will be deployed in response to Hurricane Sandy. There are 3 other AmeriCorps NCCC campuses that are closer to the storm than the Denver campus is, and those three campuses would have to be deployed before we would be. That being said, the only constant in NCCC is change. But for now, my team is still planning on heading to OK City unless we hear otherwise.
That afternoon we got to go downtown and receive tours of the state capitol building. The same man who designed Michigan's capitol designed Colorado's, too! It was neat to see the similarities. It's a very elaborate building. During construction, all the rose onyx in the world was used up. No more exists anywhere! That's very unfortunate, because it's very beautiful stone. The dome of the building is plated in 24 karat gold, but it's all covered up for renovations.
It may be hard to read in the picture, but that step on the capitol building says "One mile above sea level". Different measurements have been taken, and there's some debate about which step is actually exactly one mile high. But this one is carved in stone, so I'll stick with it.
Someone knitted a garden onto a chain link fence in the city. Beautiful!
On Wednesday we had more American Red Cross training in First Aid, CPR and AED. It was really easy for me because Keri and Dan just helped me get certified in May. Thanks, guys! That evening, we had a campus Halloween party. I had a really good time clowning around! Literally.
Today we had Tool Safety training and Quality of Life (Living Healthy in the Corps) training. All this training is meant to prepare us for whatever the year might throw at us. It's part of what makes NCCC such an effective organization! After such thorough trainign, teams are ready to deploy for almost any project at a moment's notice.
It's hard to believe that in 8 days, I'll be leaving for Oklahoma City with Fire 1. I still feel like I just arrived here in Denver! The days have felt long but the weeks have flown by. This next week will be exciting with all the preparation we'll do for our project. I'll also be officially inducted into AmeriCorps NCCC in a big ceremony! Finally, I'll have to say "See you later" to my friends who are on other teams. But we'll definitely stay in touch, and we could be together for Shuffle Round 3. It's amazing to think that soon I'll be done with Corps Training Institute and doing what I came here to do.
Oh! Hopefully one last update on my address. Now, instead of writing Fire Unit, you can write Fire 1. That will help my mail get forwarded to me faster while I'm in Oklahoma City. Sorry for all the changes, thanks for bearing with me!
That's all for now, guys! I hope you had Happy Halloweens and good weeks.
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