Earlier this year, during the visitation by South African students, HFB students had a new opportunity. Students from both sides of the exchange spent the day at Jack Straw Studio recording poetry, monologues, and songs. We are thrilled to present just a few pieces here.

Asithande:

Bongi:

Olivia:

Shadrak:

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You can see what we’ve been up to and all that we achieved last year by downloading our 2015 Annual Report!

HFB 2015 Annual Report (1)

Over the course of the trip to South Africa, my cheek muscles hurt from smiling so much. You could say that it had to do with the weather–yes, I love the sun–but I think what was most significant was the wonderful people that surrounded me, taking me into their homes, and just accepting me for who I was. I met people whose beliefs I didn’t agree with, people who treated gender roles in a way that would’ve been unacceptable to me in an American setting. I met people who were from different backgrounds than me and were part of different cultures. And still, despite all of our differences, we were able to come together in one big Hands for a Bridge family. So, for me, that’s what I’ll remember most about South Africa. The family I found there, and the bonds I formed despite the oceans that separate us.

– Sophie Grosskopf

Northern Ireland is exactly how you would picture it. The cliffs are as gorgeous and jaw-dropping as the pictures, the fields and countrysides are as green as the shamrocks so commonly thought of, and the people are as confusing and delightful as any story has ever told. Let me begin by telling you this trip was physically, mentally, and emotionally exhausting. The bonds I formed with the kids at Oakgrove were immediate and intense and exciting. We instantly loved each other. This trip was eye-opening in ways I had never known. We got to meet and hear from people who had been in prison for bombings, men and women who had lost their loved ones to the IRA, bomb survivors, and activists. The information pouring over us was both overwhelming and confusing. We had learned about the Troubles before, but we didn’t learn just how real it was-and still is. I didn’t know how to feel. Am I allowed to cry over this story of a death of a child, when their father was sitting right next to me? There came a time during this trip when we had the opportunity to see a play centered on a young man who committed suicide. This not only shook me to my core, but devastated the group as a whole. To say we opened up to each other about our feelings would be an understatement. I have always been the type of person to keep my feelings hidden, and I wanted to change that. Overtime, I look back on each situation in NI differently. I find myself thinking differently about people and things and places. I know more than I ever did before, and somehow I don’t know enough. I don’t regret going on this trip-in fact it’s the opposite. I learned how to self-reflect in a way I had never done, and I’ll always remember the moments that made me realize things I had never known about myself. I was so worried before I left, that all my friends who went to SA would forget about me, but coming home I could only think about how exited I was to share with them the details of my adventure. I am so thankful to the amazing teachers who learned, adventured, and even cried with us. The other kids who went with me on this trip are some of the most incredible people I have ever met, and all I can say is this trip has been something I will always treasure and hold close to my heart.

Juno Spafford

Hands for a Bridge was honored to host a day of education, laughter and learning on October 22 by hosting the play Sonny Sixkiller Buys the Washington Redskins.

This exciting live production by Native American playwright, Darrell Hillaire, was shown last year to an enthusiastic audience at the Moore Theatre and joined us again to Seattle onstage at Roosevelt High School!  The large cast includes tribal youth, elders and others from the Lummi Tribe.

The play was staged throughout the school day for students of Roosevelt High School, and again that evening for the community at large. Over 300 members of the community came to the evening production to explore the controversy surrounding the NFL’s Washington Redskins’ mascot and its impacts on Native Americans and all people. After each production of the play, the cast and crew hosted a dialogue session with the audience.

I was raised to be colorblind.

One person is the same as another,

but being equal in one place is different than in another.

Distinct views separate cultures, not one

alike. Some are looked down upon

as people of lower class and value,

lesser humans. In the South,

my mom grew up with these views

so peculiar to me, to you, where it was normal

to call those people with dark skin names,

to stereotype, to segregate schools and homes,

drinking fountains and busses.

I remember walking into the Atlanta airport for the first time,

my eyes got wide—everyone working at the airport

was the same color,

black.  Confusion filled my mind.

Why is it like this? Are some jobs only for people of color?

Why is it different than home?

I wouldn’t get my answer until later,

and just accepted this is how it was, that this

was normal and would always be like this

when I came to visit, unchanging as the heat

and humidity of a Georgia summer.

I blew this whole moment to the curb,

an observation from my past

I wouldn’t come to terms with until I grew up.

I was raised to be colorblind, to see

the world from a new perspective,

to sit above the clouds and look down below,

to believe I was better than people who saw coloras what defined others, a memory buried.

Innocent or oblivious as a child,

I saw my visits as experiencing a new culture,

a different way to live, something for my relatives to complain about—whether it was the loud music of their Hispanic neighbors, or the need to shop for groceries during the week to avoid the weekend crowds of Blacks and Hispanics, their strange

voices filling the air like litter in store parking lots.

My mom left her home to escape this culture,

a way of life that seemed wrong,

out of place in this land of prejudice and discrimination.

I was raised to be colorblind.

Paying attention to race as a child was uncommon to me,

but older now and reflecting on the past,

I realized I noticed race,

not just as a simple observation or memory,

but as a way of life I did not like,

forcing myself to hold back my fight to visit family,

placing myself into this established culture,

peering in from the outside, never quite fitting in,

putting up an imaginary wall to resist,

to disagree politely, to close my mouth, to think better

of causing a scene. Having no right to control,

having no right to say what is good and bad,

what is true or false, accepting that it’s difficult

to change those with strong ideals and morals,

I believe now you should voice your opinion,

show how hate is not blind but blinds us

to the pain racism has caused, and then walk away,

into a world of color and light.

We come from different worlds—

assuming the worst, without learning the best.

– Arendje Louter

Both groups spent a wonderful two weeks in either Northern Ireland or South Africa. Our trips were both extremely valuable experiences, and full of personal growth. The trips were very unique and different from each other while at the same time they had a lot of things in common. Each trip group came back enriched, changed, and closer than ever. Travel created an incomparable bond between us. While experiencing different events in the respective countries, members of both groups had learned a lot about one another. With each group having become so close, everyone was curious as to what our reu-
nited HFB class would be like upon return. The first day back we were tired and generally overjoyed to see each other. We had all just been on very influential trips and this is something we knew we shared. However, realizing that we might know a lot more now about our trip-mates than the rest of our classmates made a lot of us feel a little lost. It was hard to combine as a class again, but, after coming back from something so empowering, we were all very motivated to make change. To do this, we had to work together. Knowing that, we got to work on new projects, such as our film project and our activism projects.

Through working together to make change at Roosevelt, we connected again with those that we had spent two weeks without. Once again we became the tightly knit Hands for a Bridge class that we had come to know so well earlier in the year.

I can see the ocean.

I can see the vast, endless ocean, and maybe, just maybe, I can see the rest of my life.

I can see the future swaying in the branches of the trees, alighted on a rare cloud, and blowing past me in the wind.

My future terrifies me.

Sliding off the mountain, crashing into rocks, falling from the sky – my dream is liquid.

My future is ephemeral, not because it is short, but because even the lightest current could derail it.

I could ignore it, dive in the freezing water, swim away and never come back – or would that be good?

Will I instead sit here, waiting for a future that will never come, one that will lap at

my feet and slowly wash away the very ground I stand on?

I want a future – any future – but I want to find it.

I want to climb the tree, fly to the cloud, and catch it in the wind.

And yet…if my future is light enough to be carried by the breeze, do I want it?

I can’t let myself be carried off into nothing, nor can I sink to the bottom of the sea. So I’m just here, I guess.

I’m just stuck under the African sun.