Supervisor Training in Houston

The school bus we took from the airport had tarnished metal bars running the length of the ceiling to hold our luggage. The windows were stubborn and it took a sharp jab and tug to pop out the latches and let in the humid Texas air. Once we got moving, the breeze was nice. The bus rolled down four lane roads divided in the center by wide patches of shaggy grass. The trees on either side were a luminous green in the late afternoon heat. We shouted over the motor, talking excitedly about AMIGOS and other travels. It was almost as if we were not going to a training event, but rather to our summer host countries.

We arrived at the camp on Thursday evening, after a drive which took two and a half hours due to our having to stop twice for directions. It didn't matter, though. It felt good to be there. We didn't do much that night. Each country team met to go over the first project-specific information. I met the rest of the Brazil staff: Kate and Marianne, the project director and assistant project director, respectively, and the other supervisors, Ana, Maya and Sara. At 11:00 we went to our cabins. I made myself sleep, knowing that we would have to get an early start the next day.

On Friday morning, some senior staff members woke us at 6:30. I showered and walked through the woods to the dining hall. The schedule for the day had us in presentations, discussions, and group activities into the evening. We heard from the Latin American Programs Department, from Emily Untermeyer, who is AMIGOS' Executive Director, and from the people who staff the 24-hour on-call system during the summer. We did a low-ropes course which turned out to involve very few ropes after all, and we had more project time.

There was also a virtual town survey, in which we interviewed staffers pretending to be members of a host community. We had to gather the kinds of information that we will need to collect during our first town visits: who can host the volunteers, who can feed them, where is the nearest phone, who has a car, and so on. We agreed that survey is going to be a challenge. I look forward to it with both excitement and apprehension.

After all the daytime activities were done, we headed back to the dining hall for dinner, and from there to the lodge to meet again in our project groups. We all reconvened later around a campfire. We toasted marshmallows in the muggy night and I chatted with some new friends and with some I'd known from Boston. Before long, it was late, and we went back to our bunks. It was a good day, but long. I fell asleep easily.

We awoke to people making monkey noises on Saturday morning. I was groggy, but by the time I'd gotten a shower and headed off to breakfast, I was awake enough for the morning program. Saturday involved some more intense topics than the previous day. We began with a presentation by AMIGOS' mental health consultant on emotional issues in-country and how supervisors can help to resolve them. Then we had a quick break and the same woman organized small group discussions on staff responses to sexual assault. It was an important activity, but the situations were not easy to confront, even on paper.

Later, we talked about Feedback — AMIGOS jargon for the process of volunteers checking in with supervisors and supervisors with senior staff — and about community development. We had more time with our projects, and we snacked on M&Ms, oranges, and cookies. That night we all congregated at the outdoor basketball court for a cryptically-named Fun Activity. Shortly after we got there, the square dance caller struck up the record player and we spent the next hour cavorting around the court in Right-Hand Stars, Right-and-Left Grands, Alabama Lefts and Swings. It was great fun.

The next morning, I had the hardest time yet pulling myself out of bed, and my legs were sore. I couldn't figure out why until I tried to demonstrate one of the previous night's square dance moves to another sup. After breakfast, we took a whole-staff photo, and then met back on the basketball court for a final activity: we formed a large circle around the asphalt, turned facing outwards and closed our eyes. The facilitators silently brought about a third of the group to the inside of the circle. The leader gave instructions out loud: "Tap someone on the shoulder who inspired you." "Tap someone on the shoulder who made you laugh." "Who you admire." "Who challenged you," and so on. The people in the middle were free to tap as many people as they wished. After a few rounds, those in the center went back to the circle, and a new group went into the middle. The activity continued until everyone had been both in the middle and on the outside. It sounds corny to tell it, and maybe it was a little, but I think everyone left feeling good.

We went back to the lodge and got on a bus much like the one on which we'd come in. I sat with the other sups from Brazil. As we retraced the roads we'd taken a few days earlier, we talked about the summer, about travels we'd taken in the past, and places we'd like to go in the future. It was cooler than it had been on Thursday and Friday, and the air was drier. We arrived at the terminal in the late morning, and without even realizing it, we dissipated, our group split between the dozens of check-in counters. I wished good luck to the people I saw — people I knew from the Boston chapter, from my project in Nicaragua, from the Brazil staff, or just from Houston. I got through security and sat down at the gate to wait for my flight.

I arrived back in Boston at 9:00. My family met me at the airport. We hurried through the parking garage, and after a brief drive, they left me at South Station to wait for the 10:00 bus to Providence. I got back to Brown around 11:00. I had 105 e-mails waiting for me, most of which I still have not read.