Travel Diary Winner: Alicia Erickson

Congratulations to Alicia Erickson, winner of the fall Wing It! Contest, "Travel Diary," and runners-up Junia Zhang and Annalisa van den Bergh!

Alicia is a sophomore at the University of Washington (Seattle, WA), and her prize-winning essay about her recent trip to Ghana can be read below!

Junia is a senior at Torrey Pines High School (San Diego, CA) and was selected as a runner-up for her unique cultural perspective on traveling to visit family in China. Annalisa is a senior at United Nations International High School (New York, NY) and was selected as a runner-up for her essay about biking from Seattle to New York.

Thank you to everyone who submitted essays to the fall Contest! Each submission embodied the spirit of travel and adventure that Wing It! promotes, and we look forward to receiving your submissions to the next Contest!

Contest: Travel Diary

What did you do this summer? Visit Mayan ruins in Mexico? Check out Beefeaters at Buckingham Palace? Hike around your hometown? Yes? Perfect!

Wing It! is now accepting submissions for its new theme, "Travel Diary." Send us a non-fiction essay of no less than 500 words (and no more than 1000) about where you went and what you did this summer—even if you just lounged around your local haunts—and win 2 round-trip tickets on Virgin America, the hippest airline around!

Think you can do that? Your entry must be postmarked by October 15, 2009 to be accepted. Winners will be announced no later than October 30, 2009. Read the official rules for all the details.

A crayfish boil on the Bayou or couscous in Casablanca—share your story!
Good luck!

How To Enter

• Write a 500 word essay about your travels
• The essay must be about something you did and it must be true
• Read the official rules for details, then fill out this entry form and email it along with your essay to:

wingit_contest@globalfilm.org

or send it by mail to:

The Global Film Initiative
Attn: Wing It!
145 Ninth Street
Suite 105
San Francisco, CA 94103

Simple enough. You have until October 15 to send in your entry. If our judges think yours is the best of the bunch, you'll get 2 free airline tickets to any destination Virgin America flies and your essay will be featured on our education website, Bluescreen!

That's it!

Prizes

The first-place winner will receive 2 non–refundable tickets to anywhere Virgin America flies and be featured on the Global Film Initiative website, the Bluescreen website and in our newsletter. Runners-up will also be featured on Bluescreen. Winner will be announced by Tuesday, November 3, 2009.

Official Rules

Please click here to read a full description of the official rules for the Wing It! Contest. By entering this Contest, you agree to the rules and restrictions set forth by The Global Film Initiative.

Click here to go to the current Wing It! Contest, "What's Happening?"

Alicia's Erickson's Essay : Untitled (Trip to Ghana)

As the rickety bus named "Godsend" pulled out from the International Student Hostel, fondly called "ISH 2," I gazed one last time at the familiar landscape: the rows of brightly colored stands selling fresh fruit, clay beads, and bagged water, the lush green fields where goats and sheep grazed freely, and the rustic white buildings starkly contrasting against the vibrant red dirt. I watched as my home for the past six weeks, the University of Ghana in Legon, slowly disappeared.

There is no way to capture six weeks of exhilarating chaos and a succession of life-changing experiences than through a smattering of random details and scattered memories. The core of my six weeks in Ghana was spent studying at the country's largest university, just outside the capital, Accra. I learned about everything from the slave trade to Ghana's political, health care, and education systems, to their religious superstitions. However, there is no doubt that the majority of the learning took place outside the classroom. Within the 24 hours it took me to fly to Ghana, I had been catapulted into an entirely different reality. It is an understatement to say that I had no idea what to expect. On my first night there, I crawled into bed in a daze, accompanied by my lizard friend atop my pillow, covered in sweat from the intense humidity, and was lulled to sleep by the tempo of traditional music blaring outside my window. And after a whirlwind orientation day, during which we were scared half to death by the warning of food poisoning, malaria, and various other diseases, I, along with the other ten students on my trip were set free to roam Ghana in the coming weeks.

At the end of our first week, I had my first authentic taste of Ghana. We took a tour of Accra, where we visited the memorials of W.E.B. DuBois and Kwame Nkrumah, the first president of Ghana. We went to Jamestown, the poorest district in the capital, ate at a local chop bar, and visited the Cultural Center, a haven to Ghanaian arts and crafts - drums, batik, wood carvings, beads, and vibrantly woven kente cloth. That day I was awe-stricken by the bustling streets covered with street-side stands, and brightly-dressed locals carrying baskets on their heads, selling every good imaginable. I felt simultaneously out of place - a minority for the first time in my life, suddenly conscious of my skin color - while falling completely in love with this city that was bursting with rich culture. I never could have guessed that as the weeks went by, I would come to know those streets better than those of my hometown and that the Rastafarian drummers we met at the Art center would not only become our drum teachers, but would be the ones to see us off at the airport on our last day in Ghana.

When I returned to the USA, I was constantly bombarded with the question; "So, was it life changing?" I was completely clueless of how to tackle this monstrous question. Parts of me were inclined to reply "no." I had been anticipating this trip practically my entire life, so that I could proceed with my dream of traveling to Africa and "changing the world." While I undoubtedly had irreplaceable experiences, I returned confused, with more questions, than when I embarked on my trip. After relaying my daily routines many times over, however, I soon realized that what once had been foreign to me soon became completely ordinary. I always had to anticipate extra time to walk to class in case the torrential rains had destroyed my usual path. Returning to kill a fresh swarm of ants on my desk became a daily ritual. My 4th of July wasn't spent watching fireworks, but rather at a local funeral procession and meal at the king's palace. It didn't phase me to board onto an over crowded tro-tro (a rickety van most likely named after a popular Bible verse) with probably a goat or a sheep too, to get into town. Neither did dipping my right hand into a steaming bowl of fou fou dinner, only to find a fish head. I was privileged to travel throughout the country to witness some of the world's most breathtaking sites and historical roots - Kakum National Forest, Kumasi craft villages, Lake Volta, and the Cape Coast Slave Castle. There was nothing more exhilarating than witnessing and experiencing everything we were being taught in the classroom. My trip was filled with an endless stream of moments that impacted me in an intangible way. I can still feel the water rushing over me in Wli Falls and I can still hear the bark of the baboons in the vast Savannah. It is moments like those, which stir an incredible, adrenaline rush, leaving one feeling genuinely alive.

And it is because it impacted me in unexpected ways that makes my trip so valuable. The general population has this preconceived notion of Africa being this desolate, poverty-ridden pit-hole swarming with disease. I am guilty to admit that I was not much better. While most of the infrastructure of Ghana was in pieces and most of the country was organized in villages without running water or electricity, I quickly learned that that is their way of life. The streets were crowded with people selling local crafts and food for a living - not begging for money. But it wasn't poverty. It was just different. The most extraordinary discovery that I made in Ghana was the incredible stamina of the people. Never could I cross a street corner without seeing drumming and dancing, nor could I pass anyone with out a friendly "Akwaaba!" The faith and love they have towards humankind is breathtaking. I went, hoping to bring hope and change, but left having been changed myself and instilled with a newfound hope and faith - in the world and in my dreams.

Written by Alicia Erickson