Sensible traveler Destinations Where they went Travel gear Student travelA vacation volunteer
By Diane Daniel, Globe Correspondent, 07/21/02
|
|
||
|
Sensible traveler Destinations Where they went Travel gear Student travel |
||
Maxwell recalled people telling him, "Man, you're extreme. You look like you'd be jumping off of bridges and eating bugs." He added, "They also thought I was this big athlete, which is so untrue."
Maxwell did stay active in his weeklong service in March through Global Volunteers (www.globalvolunteers.org). He and another volunteer built shelving for Weed and Seed and did some landscaping. "The most fun was helping out kids after they got home from school," he said.
Maxwell, 20, who plays guitar and bass, recently bought a home in Lexington, where he and a friend have set up a music studio. His parents are T Max, who publishes the local music fanzine The Noise, and Ellen Epstein, who sings in the trio of Kallet, Epstein & Cicone.
Epstein told her son about Global Volunteers, a nonprofit group based in St. Paul. "She's very green and she does all sorts of good things and she's always encouraging me," he said. "It was set up like a little volunteer vacation, which is very appealing. This way I got to experience a whole new culture."
Global Volunteers offers both overseas and domestic service vacations. "Mississippi would have been my last choice because I'm really sensitive to the sun and heat. But it was a scheduling thing," he said. "I was surprised at how wonderful it was — and how cold. The wind chill was so bad we all had to go to Wal-Mart and buy sweatshirts."
Maxwell's group of 11 volunteers ranged from retirees to high school and college students on spring break; they came from seven East Coast and Midwestern states. The cost was $500 each, plus air fare. Food and lodging were supplied. "A couple people stayed with families, and for the rest there was an apartment complex that had two open apartments. We slept on air mattresses, and had a little table and a TV. I thought it was totally fine," Maxwell said.
The week started with an orientation with a Global Volunteer leader, and town officials, including "Mayor Shirley" Allen. "She's the most fun politician I've ever met," he said.
Global Volunteers started helping out in Metcalfe in 1997. This time around, one of the projects was to help the children paint a mural on the side of the Weed and Seed building. "We did the bodies first, and they made one of the heads me. It was the sweetest thing," said Maxwell, whose likeness was the only white face on the wall.
They went to the local Baptist church on Sunday. "I'm not religious at all, but as a musician I really enjoyed it," he said. "It was all singing and getting up and dancing."
The dinner spread, at City Hall, was made by "Miss Murray," 67-year-old Carrie Murray, mother of nine, a retired school cook who still cooks for the summer school recreational program.
"She's an amazing cook, and we got all this great Southern cooking. Grits and dirty rice and barbecue chicken and barbecue everything. Greens and catfish. With every meal she'd make two pies of cornbread," he said. "I wrote a postcard to my mother and thought I'd write out all the food we had, and it took up the whole card."
Maxwell said that being there "hit me more when I got home, when I stepped in my room with all the material things I had. It's an experience that changes you. I had decided even before I went on this trip that something that's really important to me is helping other people. Doing this program only made that feeling stronger. The result is so much greater than what you put into it."
And not only did he make his mother proud, but also Maxwell wants "her to go do it now, because I think she'd totally enjoy it."
Send suggestions to ddaniel@globe.com.