SANTA ANA, Colombia (UCFKnights.com) - For one week, UCF student-athletes and staff members worked with Courts for Kids in Colombia. Courts for Kids is a nonprofit organization that takes teams to economically disadvantaged areas to partner with local organizations and communities to build multi-purpose courts that provide kids with the opportunities to play sports.
This is the 12th Knights Without Borders trip, which has also seen the Black and Gold visit Puerto Rico, Costa Rica, Panama, Ireland and St. Vincent and the Grenadines, and work domestically in Orlando and New Orleans.
The following is a blog documenting their experiences throughout the week:
Grace Lindberg (Rowing):
"Today is the first day of business! Woke up at 5:30. Breakfast at 6:30. We got to the construction site/court around 9. We were welcomed nicely by all of the kids at the school. We all got a pin! So cute.
It was a hard working day. Concrete is everywhere, but it is a lot of fun. We have a mixer, so that saves a lot of time! We finished about 1/5 today. Had a great lunch of pink potato salad and chicken and rice. The local people are so friendly and nice. The kids all want pictures and autographs! So funny.
Each day we will have an individual challenge and mine was “get two animals to race.” But I got a new one of making 10 local people laugh and I already did that before I got my new challenge! All the school kids are easy to make laugh. One kid and I threw a plastic cup around for awhile and it was a lot of fun.
We are going to take a tour at 5 and have dinner at 6. It’s already been a long exhausting day, but it’s a lot of fun. We also drank water out of plastic bags. Haha. So cool.”
Dalton Jones (Cheer):
“It was a slow start for us at the work site. You could tell everyone was starting to feel it, but we were making great progress. The Colombian coffee that one of the señors brings is amazing, and I’m not even a coffee drinker! We finished one side of the court in the morning, with the poles for the hoop in place. We were late finishing up our second slab of the day because maneuvering the mixer around the hoop was difficult. After lunch we came back and finished the third slab, so now we only have two more two go and the court will be complete.
As each day progresses, I find myself remembering a lot of Spanish from high school and learning even more from conversation. I can hold basic conversations with most of the kids now, and we can typically understand each other even if it isn’t fully understood in words. Seeing how happy this community is to have us and making these memories with them makes me want to return someday.
Tonight’s activity after dinner was a show put on by the local children showcasing many of their cultural dances. The style of dance was really easy to pickup but I could tell it’s hard to master. I was surprised by how many people from the community came out to watch. It took place in the town’s central plaza. After they finished their dance, they made us get up and dance with them. Of course, me being the most awful dancer I’ve ever seen, I was reluctant, but after a couple of minutes, I felt a lot less awkward and really began to have fun with it. I would love to actually be able to practice and learn the dances.
Tomorrow is our last work day. We only have to do two slabs. Our goal is to get it done before lunch, and then we’ll have a day and a half left in Santa Ana before we travel back to Cartagena. I’ve got full confidence we can do that with the pace we’ve set these past two days.”