Week 1

Well, the first week of the September '11 DTS went really well. We now have almost all of our students, though we are still waiting on one married couple as we pray for their finances to come in. But as for now, we have all our other students in and the rest of our team together. Our team is very diverse with equal amounts of students who only speak English and who only speak Spanish and many students who can speak or at least understand both. Our students also range from 17 years old up to mid-thirties and are from all over Mexico and the USA. Each member from our team is very different from the next, but together we make up a very strong, very unified team.

This week with the DTS we mainly focused on orientation for the students and on bonding. We had class sessions almost everyday when we talked with the students about the rules, policies, values, and purposes of the base and their DTS. We also worked on binding the team together through the staff giving their testimonies, bonding games and activities, girls' and guys' nights, and just spending time together. The thing I liked the most this week that we did both for bonding and to teach dying to your rights was something we called simply "the 18 Hours." This was a time we had planned that we knew would challenge our students and get them out of their comfort zones so that God could work in us as a unit. Basically what we did was the whole base went out to Stone Island (an island just outside of Mazatlan) and had a beach day where we swam, ate dinner, and just enjoyed time together. Later, however, instead of leaving with the rest of the base our DTS stayed there on the beach for the next 16 hours. We had told them that they were only allowed to bring their sleeping bag, a towel, a water bottle, and another item of their choice. This caused them to have to either think of others or think of themselves because they could bring something that would benefit the whole group or they could bring something that would just benefit them. Basically we spent 16 hours out on the beach just figuring out how to survive together which really showed us a lot about each other and how we work together as a group. It was rough and I only slept about 3 hours because I was so itchy, but it was really good for us! Some of you might be wondering why it was called the 18 hours when we only spent 16 hours on the beach. Well when we left we told the students that they had the rest of the day free until 5 when we would meet up and go finish the last 2 hours we still had left. We got the students together at 5 and then took them to a house here in Mazatlan where the staff had prepared a nice dinner for the students just as a way to serve them. We had a great night eating and talking about the good, the bad, and the ugly of our time "roughing it." It was a great time of growing for all of us and an amazing start to what I know will be a great school!