LA Service Project

Ariella Caron
December 16, 2005

Hello. Seasons Greetings from Tonya's and Homi's teams in L.A., California.

We just wanted to share a little bit about our experience working together with the L.A. BC community in a service project a few weeks ago. On the weekend of the 25th of November, we made our way eastwards towards the mountains that housed Camp Mazundar, the location of our service project. When we arrived it was quite late and the temperature frigid compared to our usual sunny skies in L.A. Nevertheless, we found that the brothers and sisters were eagerly awaiting our arrival outside, dismissing options of play and sleep. We were thus inspired and as we got oriented we tried to reciprocate their love and interacted as long-time friends would.

The next morning, we were able to see the beauty of our environment and visit the Holy Ground. Apparently there had been a fire a while back and everything set on fire except the Holy Ground and the camp. After breakfast, we all headed toward an old temple that we intended to paint, restore and clean up in order that it eventually be used for workshops such as One Heart. The local 2nd Gen were extremely hardworking and cooperative throughout the entirety of the project and STF members felt the potential of their younger brothers and sister deeply. The long day of scraping, painting, window painting and vacuuming ended with dinner smores in our newly upgraded temple chapel. Goodbyes quickly turned into "see you next Sunday!" as the long dark blue vans pulled out towards their new destination: FUNDRAISING AREA.

Overall, as a group, we felt that the community had truly inspired us, had given us hope for the future and another reason to push ourselves daily. As we shared within our teams it became evident that what truly impressed and inspired us the most was the dedication and involvement of the elder generation couples. We were so inspired to find elder 2nd Generation not only still active, but aggressively so. It was they who organized and ran most of what went on and it was apparent that such efforts in the education of younger 2nd Gen was not unusual for them. All four of them were STF graduates and it seemed that they still held a laudable standard. This was especially moving to us because as a team, Tonya's team, we had been struggling with having hope in the future when so many of our elder brothers and sisters professed to having found God on STF, but just fell away afterwards, forgetting about all the experiences God had blessed them with. There is always hope; perhaps that is what God truly wanted to convey to us through our memorable time in the mountains of California.

Love,
Tonya's and Homi's Teams

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