Often times, someone who devotes their time to helping others becomes idolized in the eyes of many. This is exactly what happened to Callie Scott (’15), after volunteering her time over the summer to community service work in Africa.

Scott embarked on this journey with a group of young adults from Habitat for Humanity. Scott says, “Overall, my trip was life changing.  I’ve met so many people who I built along side with that have made a huge impression on me. And that will stay with me forever.”

On a day-to-day basis, Scott would wake up at six o’clock in the morning, eat breakfast at the hotel (which was strictly bread and jam), and then leave for the building site at 7:30. Due to the fact that it was winter at the time of Scott’s trip, they would stay at the building site until three o’clock in the afternoon, which is when it got dark. After that, they would have a forty-five minute lunch break, then go back to the hotel, shower, and have dinner. After dinner came the education part of the trip and then bed by ten o’clock. Just reading this probably exhausts many!

Scott’s trip was fourteen days long, including two days for travel since the flight time was seventeen hours. Scott says, “Myself and thirteen other people my age from around the world traveled to the country of Mozambique.” Mozambique is northeast of South Africa, right next to Madagascar.

The children Scott worked with spoke broken English along with their native language of Changani. Scott says her favorite aspect was playing with, talking to, and bonding with these children.

“It was definitely amazing to see them every day with a smile on their face, when they have nothing,” says Scott.

Although Scott took many lessons out of this outstanding summer trip, the lesson she says stuck with her the most was to be happy. Not only did Scott teach the children she worked with something, they taught her something as well. “They taught me there is always something to be happy about,” says Scott. “They also taught me how to eat raw sugarcane… which was also pretty interesting.”

Since Scott’s trip, she is learning how to apply the lessons she learned to her every day life. Scott says, “I try to find something everyday to be happy about, even if I have to think back to the experiences I had on the trip.”

Between the impoverished people Scott met, along with the people Scott experienced Mozambique with, Scott has learned that there is always something to celebrate.