2 Weeks and 200 Details to Go

The to do list and packing list for this trip are unlike my lists in October when I traveled to Ireland for a wedding in Belfast. Last time, my to do list entailed having my hair done, having a pedicure, buying a wedding gift and card, and making and freezing meals for my husband and our youngest daughter so they wouldn't eat pasta or pizza every night. The packing list included warm sweaters, a dress for the wedding, heels, makeup, perfume, phone, charger, other vanity items, and always -- always -- my camera.

This time, my to do list does include making and freezing meals for 12 nights, but it also includes buying travel toilet paper for 12 days (apparently there is none in the Philippines...?), buying an extra camera battery (because who knows if there will be electricity to recharge), buying a compact inflatable life vest for our bamboo boat voyage to one location, buying a insect-repelling sleeping sack so I'm not bitten by anything sketchy at night, being injected with travel vaccines for Hepatitis A and Typhoid (I was a little late to get the Yellow Fever vaccine, but the risk is low this time of year), hearing my travel doctor explain the litany of things to avoid doing while traveling to a 3rd world location (don't drink or brush your teeth with the water, don't even allow the water in your mouth while showering, don't eat any fruit that doesn't have a peel or a shell or that was washed with unboiled water, don't eat shellfish, salads, buffet foods exposed to flies, under-cooked foods and unpasteurized dairy products, don't wear shorts and short sleeved shirts to avoid deadly bug bites unless I can't stand the heat ... the list is too long to include it all here).

In addition to the items listed above, I will not be packing much makeup (but let's be real -- I am packing some). I will be packing a solar phone charger, lots and lots of hand sanitizer and wipes, not many clothes (can't have too big of a suitcase), laundry detergent pods (to wash and rewash those few clothes), small loom rubber bands to hand out to children for bracelet making, a wifi hot spot that I hope works in the Philippines, a Bluetooth keyboard to write this blog on my phone, and -- no surprise -- my camera.

The potential hazards don't frighten me much, because I know I'll use caution, but I'll also be with people who have done this trip four times before and know what they're doing. However, the details are a little overwhelming and have already ignited the sleeplessness that comes for me when my my brain has an overload of new information.

My usual mantra of "letting go and letting God" won't come in handy if God isn't willing to make lists and run errands for me, but maybe He'll help slow down my brain at night when I offer up my mind in prayer and thanksgiving for the gift of this opportunity.

Prepare Cabin & Brain for Departure

In two days, I leave my husband and children and literally fly up over the top of the earth and back down on the other side to Hong Kong, then the Philippines. (The flight route is over the North Pole, so you know I'll be geotagging a pic from up there!) Am I nervous about spending 12 days in remote areas so far away from my family? A month ago, I could have listed a dozen reasons to answer, "Yes!" But knowledge is power and, since then, I've steadily loaded my information arsenal. My details are all set, my various third world packing items are 99% gathered, my schedule is distributed to the handful of people who asked for it, and my very active adventure gene is ready for take off.

Now that those details are in place, I can set my sights on the journey itself and settle back with a reminder of why I am taking this trip: focusing out, giving back and being in the experience that I so often write about for Watts of Love. I am very open to what this experience will look like and no matter how it all plays out, I know one thing is for certain: I will return better than I left.

For the last five or six years, especially, I have had a genuine appreciation for how blessed I am and how small my life obstacles are. Yet, it's challenging for anyone not to be caught up in the details of our lives. We are guilty of making the unimportant seem vital, the insignificant obstacle seem insurmountable. In daily life, my daughter not joining enough extra-curricular activities to impress colleges or the rotting front steps to our house that need replacing seem important. I imagine I will experience a refreshing and sizable shift in perspective when I witness true joy on the face of a human being who has lived without electricity for their entire life and who has been given the gift of free, safe, solar light. Thanks to countless moments like these, I'll be the one receiving the most precious gift.

Combine this with the likely bonding that comes with a team of people who are on a journey like this together, as well as the rare opportunity to see a remote part of the world and spend time with an indigenous people, and we have the theater lit for a pinnacle life experience to play out.

Now, if the snowstorm that is predicted to hit New York at the precise day and hour of my departure would just head out to sea for me, I can get this life-changing thing underway and on schedule!

2/13/17

So this is real

** Because of poor wifi, my posts are delayed a couple days. This post was written Saturday night, February 11. **

     So this is real. Really Asia, really the Philippines, really a group of incredible people. Thanks to a blizzard that hit New York City and did not blow out to sea as I had previously wished in my last blog post, I made a hasty departure a day earlier than planned and arrived in the Philippines alone and twenty-four hours before the rest of the team. Thankfully, Watts of Love is professional and experienced in the curve balls of travel and my hotel room was ready for me to crash in after 23 hours in the air. Most of that time was a surreal continuous darkness as we chased the sun westward.

I met my roommate this morning when I woke up in my hotel room and she was in the bed next to me. We hit it off from the moment a groggy, "Good morning!" was exchanged. We met wearing pajamas and no make up -- crazy hair and all. I met the remainder of the team over breakfast and they are each interesting, fun and kind. The energy is enthusiastic and infectious. Everyone is here to make a difference and many have traveled before with Watts of Love, some several times, some once or twice. I'm one of 6 out of the team of 18 people who are on their maiden voyages.

     Tonight at our first team meeting, we introduced ourselves and offered a few tidbits about us, including if we had previously traveled with Watts of Love. One woman told us that the experience of empowering people, hearing their stories, and connecting with them, is addictive. She followed that up by telling us that her family had had an "intervention" with her, so this would be her *only* time traveling with Watts of Love this year.

     Part of our training tonight was in teaching the prospective light recipients how to use and care for their solar lights, as we will each be doing in one-on-one time with them. You might think that to be a few minute process. But, aside from the human connection moments of simply asking a recipient's name and showing him or her special attention and care, there is a more basic element that we take for granted. Imagine that your life has been completely without electricity. If that were the case, you wouldn't understand the concept of pushing a button, because you've never had any buttons to push. And plugging something in is another concept with absolutely no frame of reference. We were instructed that, in most cases, we'll actually have to take someone's finger and press the button or push in the cord with them, because they truly don't understand the concept, nor the tactile requirement involved.

     This small piece of information was my moment of reality. This is real. And tomorrow morning at 3am, we meet in the lobby and leave for the island of Mindoro to go push some figurative light-giving buttons and create that reality.

Love Has No Language Barrier

    A Manyan woman stood with the portable microphone we brought with us to her village and was so overcome by emotion that she had to pass it to another villager before she could take her turn to speak. We were gathered in a small pavilion, mixed together with the villagers and their many beautiful children of a remote town amidst dried farm fields and tiny shacks. The people were sharing their stories with us through our Filipino team member and translator of how Watts of Love solar lights had changed their lives.

     The emotional, sweet and diminutive woman tried several times to speak before Candice, one of our team members, who has been on several trips with Watts of Love, walked over to her and took her into her arms. She held her and soothed her for at least twenty minutes before the woman was able to compose herself.

I was so moved by the unconditional giving of love in that moment. Candice doesn't speak Tagalog and the woman she held doesn't speak English. What they both speak is love and they speak it genuinely, vulnerably and unconditionally. 

     After we left their village, we drove with our military escort (who were there more to serve with us than to protect us, because everywhere we have gone, we have been greeted with smiles and welcoming faces) back through the dried river beds and trails to the church. The Bishop had flown in with us to say Mass here with the people, which is a testament to the work Watts of love has done in five years. The church where we gathered was small, white walled, blue roofed, and beautiful, with a Spanish influence. I couldn't get over how these people -- who live in one room shanties with dirt floors and walls that are not private -- could use their sparse resources to create such a lovely place of worship.

     Not everyone on our team is Catholic or even Christian, of course, but everyone was honored to share the rich and strong faith of these beautiful people for that Mass. As we listened to them sing their hymns in Tagalog and as we spoke our prayers along with them in English, I was in awe of something I had always known intellectually, but hadn't truly experienced before emotionally. I've been to Masses spoken in other languages in foreign places, but in this moment, in this place, with these people, in a combination of their language and ours, with their children sitting on our laps, I realized on a much deeper level that faith is Universal.

     It doesn't have to be the same faith even, in my opinion. But the gift of faith in any higher force, shared together, speaking the most important language -- the Universal language of love -- was more powerful than any emotional light delivery or any UN peace treaty or anything in between.

     We can all take a lesson from Candice with her genuine, vulnerable and unconditional love. That's a language we could all use to be more fluent in.

Come Hell or High Water

     Not much can stop a band of 18 love warriors determined to deliver solar lights to people. We started out the day yesterday with literal sunshine and roses. The sun was bright and hot and the sky was the kind of blue that I've only seen before through the filter of sunglasses. When we arrived at the school where we had started distributing the day before, the interpreters and teachers, who were helping us train and organize the local Mangyan recipients, gave us each an artificial rose for Valentine's Day. To top that off, the children of the village handed us all hand made Valentine's Day cards with huge smiles and hugs. The day truly could not have started out more like a fairytale and it was pointed out to us how blessed we were to be having such an idyllic experience.

     That was the first of four distributions we were to have yesterday. The introductions and presentations were done under the shade of a massive mango tree and the one-on-one trainings were done in a fairly well-ventilated classroom.

The second location was about 30 minutes from there. We knew everything would go smoothly when we noticed a church at the center of their tiny shack village. It was sweetly named, "Sulong-Ipil Happy Dream Church." This is where the recipients were trained.

     All along I have been amazed by Nancy Economou, the founder and CEO of Watts of Love. She is a force in the best sense and very little will keep her from distributing lights to these people whom she defends and believes in. When our third light distribution turned out to be a situation where we'd have to walk the team and the lights across a large rice patty field and into unknown territory for an undetermined distance, she said, "Have them come to us, because we still have another distribution to do before the end of the day. We'll do the training and distribution right here on the side of the road." And we did.

       The people came through the rice patties and up the very dusty dirt path that Nancy called a road. The Mangyans settled under yet another massive mango tree, while the Watts of Love Team lined up on the road to face them and begin a makeshift presentation and training on the fly.

     I was able to train recipients on our first day so I'd have the opportunity to understand the experience on a personal one-on-one level. However, my role on this trip has been photographer. Because of that, I had the immense blessing of witnessing this scene from a different perspective than everyone else. As it unfolded, I knew the typical shots of people being trained were not shots I needed. The shots that told the story were the big picture, so I hopped up on the flatbed of the pickup truck loaded with Watts of Love light boxes and gear and balanced on the edges of the tail gate and side wall so I could watch my team. I was in awe.

      No photo has the ability to tell that story, with its scope of activity and emotions present, but I took about fifty anyway. And as I observed everyone kneeling in the path-side tall grasses next to the humble indigenous people as they received and were trained in the use of their solar lights, I took in every single thing I could focus my senses on. The smiles, the sign language when interpreters were busy, the laughter, the joy, the focus, the efficiency, the determination, and best of all, the results: new solar light owners who now have the tools to raise themselves up out of poverty.

     However, as amazing our third stop was, it was the fourth one that elevated everything to a new level. Our caravan of vans and pickup trucks traveled to the end of a long dirt road through exquisite countryside, full of panoramas of distant volcanic mountains framed by rice patties and rivers. Next, we walked through a short sandy path of dune grasses to a wide river that during the wet season is probably treacherous and deep, but that was now thigh high and flowing beautifully over a bed dense with large stones. The locals who were helping us with gear pioneered the crossing, carrying heavy boxes on their heads that were packed with lights and the basic necessities for a distribution and training. Next, the rest of us waded through the clear water, laughing and smiling and soaking up every moment of our adventure. I was water-jogging beside people, taking photos and laughing at half-jokes of the possibilities of me toppling over with my gear into the river. It was a scene out of a movie and it was the perfect set up to what was to come.

      As we climbed up the river bank and onto a lush, green plateau, there was an isolated, indigenous and timid people waiting for us. They seemed unsure of what was descending upon them, but once the magic of our leaders began their presentation, emanating joy and sunshine, the smiles and laughter released themselves from our wary recipients. The rest of the distribution unfolded as if it were inspired by Seurat's "La Grande Jatte." People were scattered on the lush grass as if at a Sunday afternoon picnic. But instead of leisure and luxury, this was about life necessities in the form of pure love.

      Later, as we were descending back to the river, we knew the beautiful families we had just connected with were bringing their new solar lights back to their huts and for the first time ever after sunset, they would light up their village.

(There are several photos below from our 4-5 distributions over 2 days.)

    Last night was our team dinner in Manila before we each departed early this morning. Over dinner, we each shared some of our reflections on the week, which eventually turned into an eighteen person round table discussion on thoughts moving forward for Watts of Love and their mission.

    I had the chance to connect with each and every incredible person on this team. They are all leaders in some capacity in their lives and I'm in awe of them all individually and as a powerhouse unit. With a group like this and on a mission like this, you can imagine how inspiring a round table discussion would be.

    I wouldn't presume permission to share their thoughts, but I'll share some of the things that I offered up last night, as well as some little seedlings that were planted in my brain because of these brilliant people.

    During these past 8 days of immersion on the islands of the Philippines, the one thing I noticed of the people who had not previously received lights is that they have all been in survival mode. They have nothing but a modest roof over their heads, each other and often barely enough to feed themselves (sometimes not enough). They don't know what it's like to dream -- to wish for something more -- because they often don't know that there is more than being hungry, being sick, living in darkness, or even living in fear of what or who will come and prey on them at night.

    The one consistent thought I had when I interacted with the people (especially the children) was, "What are their talents and gifts?" We each have natural talents and gifts that, in our first world opportunities, are channeled while we're young into schooling and then careers. We have a myriad of choices of how to use these opportunities and, if there is no job that already exists that is perfect for us, we have opportunity to create a new one.

    Our world is all about opportunity. Theirs is not.

    I walked through these villages and thought, "I wonder if this person has a gift for science ... or this one is the storyteller of the community ... a writer ... a mathematician ... a teacher ... an artist." What could they be if they had the chance to dream?

    When Nancy, founder and CEO of Watts of Love, was talking to me about the people raising themselves up out of poverty, she told me, "I don't want them to leave to be in our world. I want them to do well where they are." And this helped me understand that it's presumptuous to assume that these people, who are in survival mode, should have my life. I see what Nancy sees -- them using their gifts here. They get to thrive in their world and help their neighbors to do the same.

    One evening, after we returned on the banka boat after a very long, hot and exhausting day, we were just in time for sunset. Kevin Kuster, Nancy's brother and my friend who introduced me to Watts of Love, was having a photo shoot with some locals along and in the water. I don't have the chance to see sunsets very often where I live, because the trees are so dense and a hill blocks the western view from my house. The equatorial sunset the night before was a deep red that lit the sky ablaze and I wanted to witness more of that, so I opted to stay near Kevin's shoot and refuel myself by taking some photos just for me, instead of joining the rest of the team on a visit to a few local homes before dinner.

    I wandered off into the cerulean water, which is shallow enough at high tide to reach out 100 yards and still be only knee or thigh deep. For safety, I kept Kevin in sight and proceeded to shoot the reflecting reds and oranges that were increasing exponentially in saturation and intensity as the sun lowered. Before I knew it, a band of boys had descended upon me to watch me shoot. I was using sign language to see if they'd pose for me with my head lamp, but one very bright boy, Lawrence, started translating for me. He amazed me with how fluent he was in English at only ten years old. After finishing, we waded back to shore and I told him how impressed I was with his kindness and intelligence and his willingness to help me. I said, "Lawrence, you're so smart. I believe you can be anything you want to be. What do you want to be when you grow up?" "Police," he said shyly. I teared up when I heard his answer. "I know you'll be that. You're smart enough to be a detective or a head of police." I told him. Lawrence has been thriving in part because of Watts of Love, who has been coming to his village on Ilin Island and delivering solar lights for five years. And because of that, he dreams.

    Five years ago, there was no thriving or dreaming. I was meant to be there with Lawrence in that moment, just him and me. The next two times I saw him, I hugged and kissed him on the head and let him know how special he is by bragging to my team members about him.

    Thanks to Nancy and my experience traveling with Watts of Love, I've learned that what works isn't "fixing" people in hardship. They're not broken. Nor is it about hand outs. It's about giving them a hand up and empowering them to use a one-time opportunity to have a vision and dream -- in this case with some basic knowledge and a solar light to literally and figuratively see those dreams.

My Volunteer Vacation with WattsOfLove.org to the Philippines

I have an active adventure and travel gene. My heart pounds and my adrenaline surges when planning a trip. I rarely concern myself with minutiae, instead I trust that everything will work out for the best with any potential conflicts of timing, weather, meet ups, or any other non-vital detail. But when Watts of Love suggested I join them on their light distribution trip to the Philippines last February, my stomach turned inside out and my nerves were decidedly in charge.

As a writer for WOL, I’ve heard several of their travel experiences and have had hundreds of my questions answered. One would think I would have no unknowns left. But there were countless factors that led the raging battle of nerves versus my norm. To my surprise, my lack of real information was the largest — the details. In my interviewing, I had never asked anyone if they needed malaria shots or if they packed waterproof makeup. The Philippines had never even been on my radar as a destination and I soon realized that my fire for adventure only burns when fueled by knowledge (something which comforts my much more cautious husband).

After my first conversations with Christie Dunne, WOL’s Global Travel Team Coordinator, and after WOL’s team call, my essential information arsenal loaded itself and the adventure adrenaline resumed its surge. WOL’s deep knowledge and experience allowed me to release any worries. They provided the travel team with a comprehensive packing list, as well as a detailed itinerary, then also answered our loose-end-questions. I could prepare my brain for departure once I ticked all the items off this long list.

Once nerves were, indeed, in check, my sights were on the journey itself, and I settled into why I was going to the Philippines with Watts of Love: focusing out, giving back and being in the experience that I so often have written about for them. I was very open to what this journey would look like. No matter how it all played out, I knew one thing for certain: I would return better than I left.

For the previous bunch of years especially, I had had a genuine appreciation for my blessings and for my minimal life obstacles. Even so, it's challenging for people not to be caught up in the details of their lives. We are all guilty of making the unimportant seem vital, the insignificant obstacle seem insurmountable. In daily life, my broken kitchen cabinets or my teen daughter’s untidy room created an illusion of gravity.

When departure day arrived, a blizzard charging toward the northeast US forced me to alter my flight plans and travel without the rest of the team. It was a slight mental setback, but my preparation was my ally and spending 24 hours traveling alone was one of those faux gravity moments I was ready to move beyond. Arriving in the Philippines a day ahead of my team, made it so I comically didn’t meet my roommate, Audrey Elisha (now a WOL Board Member) until I awoke in my hotel room and she was in the next bed. The trip had already set itself up to be unlike any other. It’s hard not to befriend someone immediately who introduced herself to me with a similar pajama-wearing, groggy, “Mornin'!” The remainder of the team was introduced to me over breakfast and were each interesting, outgoing and noticeably kind. The dynamic within the group vibrated with enthusiasm. It was infectious. Everyone was there to make a difference. Many had traveled before with WOL -- some several times, some once or twice. I was one of only six in the team of eighteen people who was on her maiden voyage.

Later that night, we reconvened for our first official team meeting and training over dinner. Team leaders, like Nancy Economou, WOL’s co-founder and CEO, Christie, and Kevin Kuster, founding member and Creative Director (who would be shooting a marketing video over the course of our nine days together), spoke to us on some anticipated items, like how to respectfully represent WOL, as well as how to teach recipients how to care for their lights. They also pointed out unanticipated items, which were a cultural wake up. Aside from how we should introduce ourselves, there would be a more basic element that we in developed nations take for granted. The simple concept of pushing a button or plugging something in, let alone associating it with a reaction of any kind, is in the framework of what needs to be taught before handing a solar light to its owner. We were instructed that, in most cases, we would actually have to take someone's finger and press the button or push in the cord with them, because they wouldn’t even understand the tactile requirement. This last piece of information was my moment of reality. I remember thinking, “This is real.”

The following day, a Mangyan woman stood with the portable microphone we brought with us to her village and was so overcome by emotion that she had to pass it to another villager before she could take her turn to speak. We were gathered in a small pavilion of a remote town amidst dried farm fields and tiny shacks, mixed together with the villagers and their many children. Through our Filipino team member and translator, Ruth Keijdener, they were sharing their stories of how WOL solar lights had changed their lives.

The emotional, diminutive woman tried several times to speak before Candice Mishkin, a Watts of Love Board Member, also an expert in emotional crisis relief, walked over to embrace the woman. She held and soothed her for at least fifteen minutes before the woman was able to compose herself. Candice’s unconditional giving of love moved me. She doesn't speak the local Tagalog and the woman she comforted doesn't speak English. What they both speak is love and they speak it genuinely, vulnerably and unconditionally.

Later, we drove with our military escort (who was there more to help us than to protect us) back through the dried river beds and trails to a small, white-washed, blue-roofed church. The Bishop had flown in with us to say Mass for our team, which was a testament to the work WOL has done in the five years they have been going to the Philippines.

Not everyone on our team is Catholic, of course, but everyone was honored to share the rich and strong faith of these beautiful people. As we listened to the villagers sing their hymns in Tagalog and as we spoke our prayers in English, I was overcome by something I had always known intellectually, but hadn't yet experienced emotionally. I had been to Masses spoken in other languages in foreign places, but in that moment, in that place, with those people, in a combination of their language and ours, with their children sitting on our laps, I realized on a much deeper level that faith is Universal.

The gift of any faith, shared together, speaking the most important language -- the Universal language of love -- was more powerful than any emotional light delivery or any UN peace treaty or anything in between. We can all take a lesson from Candice with her genuine, unconditional love. That's a language in which we could all use more fluency.

A couple days later, we started our second light distribution with literal sunshine and roses. The sun was bright and the kind of hot one would expect in southeast Asia. The sky was a shade and vibrancy that I've only seen before through the filter of sunglasses. When we arrived at the school to distribute, the interpreters and teachers, who were helping us train and organize the local Mangyan recipients, handed each of us an artificial rose for Valentine's Day. Even better, the children of the village smiled and hugged us as they delivered handmade Valentine's Day cards.

Each light distribution begins with a group introduction of the team to recipients, as well as a presentation of the lights and a basic training before the one-on-one sessions. That morning, the presentations were performed under the shade of a massive mango tree and the one-on-one trainings were carried out in a fairly well-ventilated classroom. Building upon the already idyllic experience in the rising action of the day, the second of our four distributions was thirty minutes away at a church in the center of a tiny shack village named “Sulong-Ipil Happy Dream Church”. Is there a better name for a church when the day has begun so perfectly?

From my first interview with Nancy in September of 2015, it was evident that her strength is in her innate understand of the human condition and our basic needs to thrive. She is a force in the best sense and very little will keep her from distributing lights to the people whom she defends and believes in with her whole being. When our third light distribution turned out to be a situation where we'd have to walk the team and the lights across a large rice patty field and into the unknown jungle for an undetermined distance, she wasn’t deterred in the least. She was decisive. “Have them come to us. We still have another distribution to do before the end of the day. We'll do the training and distribution right here on the side of the road.” And we did.

The Mangyans from the surrounding remote areas filtered in through the expansive rice patties and up to the very dusty dirt path that Nancy called a road. The people settled under yet another protective mango tree and the WOL Team lined up on the road facing them and began a makeshift presentation and training with the help of our volunteer Filipino interpreters.

My role on this trip was as photographer. However, at our first distribution, I also trained recipients so that I would understand the experience on a personal one-on-one level. Because of this, I had the immense blessing of witnessing this pastoral scene from a different perspective than everyone else. As the training unfolded, I knew the photos would tell the story. I balanced on the edges of a pickup truck’s tail gate, to capture the entire scene and witness my team in action. It was awe-inspiring.

No photo has the ability to tell that story, with its scope of controlled chaos and human-to-human connections present in that scene, but I took at least fifty anyway. As I observed my team kneeling in the tall grasses alongside the dusty road, next to the humble indigenous people, I absorbed the smiles, the sign language when interpreters were unavailable, the oppressive heat and humidity, the laughter of discovery and camaraderie, the veil of red-brown dust that settled onto sweaty exposed skin, the joy of hope, the focus of learning, the efficiency of makeshift teaching, the determination. Best of all, the results: new solar light owners who now have the tools to emancipate themselves out of poverty … and the elation radiating from them.

However, as amazing as that third distribution was, it was the fourth one that elevated the day into memory. Our caravan of vans and pickup trucks drove to the end of a long dirt road through exquisite countryside full of  panoramas of distant volcanic mountains framed by dense, abundant rice patties and clear rivers. Next, we walked through a short sandy path of dune grasses to a river that during the wet season is likely treacherous and deep, but which was now thigh high and flowing lyrically over a bed full of large, round stones. The locals who had been helping us with gear crossed first, carrying on their heads the heavy boxes that were packed with lights and the basic necessities for a distribution and training. The rest of us followed, crossing through the rejuvenating, clear, cool water, laughing and smiling and soaking up these remarkable moments of our combined adventure. I water-jogged beside everyone, taking photos and rebuffing half-jokes of the possibilities of toppling into the river with my gear. But that would never happen on such a day. It was an appropriate entrée to the perfect ending of this day.

We climbed up the river bank and onto a verdant green plateau, where an isolated, indigenous and timid people were waiting for us. They seemed unsure of what was descending upon them, but once our leaders introduced themselves and began presenting, grins and giggles released themselves from our wary recipients. It was magical. The remainder of the distribution unfolded as if inspired by Seurat's "La Grande Jatte." Instead of leisure and luxury, however, this was about life necessities.

Later, as we descended back to the river, we were content, understanding that the families whom we had just served were bringing lights back to their huts and, for the first time ever after sunset, would have light in their village.

Over dinner with the team on our final night in the Philippines, we each shared some of our reflections on the week, which eventually turned into an eighteen person round table discussion on thoughts moving forward for Watts of Love and their mission. During our journey, I had the chance to connect with each and every extraordinary person on this team. In their lives, they are all leaders in some capacity and I admire them individually and as a powerhouse unit. With a group like that and on a mission like this, you can imagine how inspiring a round table discussion would be.

In the eight days of immersion on the islands of the Philippines, the one thing I noticed about the people who had not previously received lights is that they have all been simply surviving. They have nothing but a modest roof over their heads, each other, and often barely enough to feed themselves, sometimes not enough. They don't know what it's like to wish for something more, because they often don't know that there is more to life than being hungry, being sick, living in darkness, and often living in fear of what or who will come and prey on them at night.

One thought that was consistent while I interacted with people (especially the children) was, “What are their talents and gifts?” We each have natural talents and gifts that, in our world of opportunity, are channeled into schooling and careers when we're young. We have a myriad of choices of how to use these gifts and, if there is no job that already exists that is perfect for us, we have luxury to create one.

Our world is all about opportunity. Theirs is not.

As I walked through villages, I often thought, “I wonder if this person has a gift for science ... or this one is the storyteller of the community … a mathematician ... a teacher ... an artist.” What would they be if they had the chance to dream outside of the parameters of their current circumstances?

When Nancy was explaining to me about people raising themselves up out of poverty, she told me, “I don't want them to leave and be in our world. I want them to do well where they are.” I understood then that I don't need these people to raise themselves up and have my life. How arrogant we are when this is what we believe people need or even want. They get to use their gifts where they are and to thrive in their world. And they get to help their neighbors to do the same.

One evening, we returned on the banka boat from an extended, scorching and exhausting day and were just in time for an equatorial sunset that lit the sky ablaze. I don't have the chance to see sunsets very often where I live, so I was eager to photograph this rarity in my life. I wandered off into the cerulean water, which was shallow enough at low tide to reach out at least 100 yards and still be only knee deep. I shot silhouettes of the moored banka boats against the reflecting rubescent sky that was increasing exponentially in saturation and intensity. Soon, a ensemble of young boys had gravitated toward me to watch me work. I started to use sign language to ask them to pose with a head lamp for me, but one very bright boy started translating. He astonished me with how fluent he was in english at only ten years old. After finishing, we waded back to shore as I talked with Lawrence, my little translator and new friend. I praised him for his kindness and intelligence and his willingness to help me. I said, "Lawrence, you're so smart. I believe you can be anything you want to be. What do you want to be when you grow up?" "Police," he said shyly. I teared up when I heard his answer. He had been been thriving in part because of Watts of Love, who had been returning to his village on Ilin Island and delivering solar lights for five years. Because of that, he dreams beyond what he would have been able to five years ago.

I was meant to be there with Lawrence in that moment, just him and me. The next two times I saw him, I hugged and kissed the top of his head and bragged to my team about how special he is.
My biggest learning from Nancy and her vision — and the reality she has created — is what works isn't “fixing” people in hardship. They're not broken. Nor is it about hand outs. It's about giving them a hand up and empowering them to use a one-time opportunity to have a vision and dream. In this case, the hand up is some basic knowledge and a solar light to literally and figuratively see those dreams.

When I began this adventure, I knew that I would experience a refreshing and sizable shift in perspective, witnessing true joy on the face of a human being who has lived without electricity for their entire life and who has received the gift of free, safe, solar light. Combine that experience with the bonding that was created with an exceptional team of people who were on a journey of giving together, as well as the occasion to have seen a remote part of the world and spend time with its indigenous people, and the adventure becomes more of a pinnacle life voyage.

It was clear that we had received a precious gift on this journey.