By Halley Belt

Waking up in my home city was awesome. I love Boston. Not just because I have lived in the area my whole life, but because of the people who make up a welcoming atmosphere filling the historic streets.

After the usual buffet breakfast, the now 20 of us (our group is shrinking as people had only signed up for the 3 or 4 week trip) headed onto our second home (the bus!) for a packed day of activities centered around history and our government.

We started at Walden Pond, a peaceful place on the border of Lincoln and Concord. In the tranquil woods, we sat together and learned a brief biography of Henry David Thoreau, a transcendentalist writer who called this place home for a number of years. After teaching us about his life, Max, our counselor, veered into reading one of Thoreau’s poems called “Prayer.” After discussing it’s meaning we were all given a quote of Thoreau’s to read to the group and then we all joined together to decipher the meaning of each.

Max speaking about Thoreau at Walden Pond	kids reading selections by Thoreau

After lunch and free time in Harvard Square in Cambridge, my lifetime best friend and fellow Etgarian, who recently departed the trip, Ariel Fanger, joined us for the rest of the day. Our next meeting was with an organization called United for a Fair Economy. They raise awareness that wealth and power disassembles the economy, widens the racial gap, corrupts democracy, and rips apart communities.  Their goal is to gain support in order to aid the building of social movements for a greater economy.

I am going to admit it, I was extremely confused during the meeting. So were many others on our trip. I am undecided on my views concerning this topic. What I did learn was that the American economy is set on a basis of rules that, over the years, has morphed to benefit a few at the cost of many. One third of our economy belongs to the wealthiest 1% of our society. When viewed along racial lines, this inequality is even more visible.

using chairs to show how wealth is distributed in America and that 1% owns 70% of wealth while the remaining 99% divide up 30%

After the long, info filled meeting, we walked to the first stop on our self guided Freedom Trail tour. Billy walked us around and showed us the sites as well as spoke to us about how the idea of the revolution that led to our country was formed at each of these sites.

on the Freedom Trail
		Holocaust Memorial

Dinner was a lovely barbeque hosted at the home of Aaron Stier-Cohen. Thanks to his mom for her hospitality. It was great to have a home cooked meal after eating on the road for a month! One thing I cannot wait for when I return home is to eat the food my parents make for once, even if I hate it.

hanging out and eating dinner at Aaron's house

Stuffed from dinner, we wearily headed back to the hotel for some free time before we crashed. Another jam packed day!