by Patrick Wee (6C), Hoofprint Associate Editor

Tears running down our eyes, sadness in our faces and a feeling of despair are what might have been sensed that February 2 afternoon when it was time to say goodbye to our newfound friends from the three other EDSOR schools: ICA, La Salle and Poveda.

The day of February 1, 2008 started when all the grade school delegates of Xavier School assembled near the HS building. Just a few minutes, we arrived at ICA, the EDSOR sponsoring school this year. The day started with a solemn prayer service. The logo of EDSOR was explained next. The theme of this year’s EDSOR Peace Conference was Challenging Your Comfort Zones. ICA’s directress, Sr. Dina Ang, had a few opening remarks before our inspirational speaker gave his speech. Mr. Francis Kong spoke to us about making decisions. For me, the best lesson I learned was that stupid decisions do get stupid results. It tells me to be careful of what I will say or do because that will be my future. After a few more minutes, our group assembled. Each group consisted of five males and five females from the different schools. Our group had three Icans , two Povedans, three La Sallites and three Xaverians.

After grouping together, we proceeded to having our first meal together. YUM! The table was so silent that even drop of a pin will be heard. Well, after eating, we got to know more about each other and started to get talking.

Just after recess, we had a solidarity pilgrimage around the school. Again, we were to try our comfort zones. Some of these activities were sewing for the boys, walking barefoot across sands and pebbles for all of us, sorting trash and selling sampaguitta. For me, the best activity was when we cleaned the classroom. We were given a messy classroom and a VERY dirty comfort room. We had to clean them in ten minutes. Believe it, it was really hard! The floors were all dirty, the toilets soiled and the sink rather messy. We cleaned it until it sparkled. I really liked this activity because these things are what we take for granted. The CR’s we use in schools, we just leave it dirty, not knowing that a janitor would take time and effort to clean it whereas if we help keep it clean, we lighten his task and thus, as our school song says, “give a helping hand to lighten someone’s load.”

After the VERY tiring Solidarity race, we had our lunch, and then we proceeded to our afternoon art activities. This was an assortment of art activities which included a Dance Workshop, Perspective-Sketching, Photo Album-Photography, Fantasy Story Writing and the Black Theater. I chose the Perspective-Sketching. It was very interesting to know that other than the normal things we study in art like the oblique, orthographic and some other types of drawings, there is one called perspective.

To end the day, we had a prayer made by the Black Theater. It summarized everything we did.

Hip-hop abs started the second day. The Dance Club presented their hip-hop abs dance. We had a solemn prayer while reflecting on the works we made the previous day. After our solemn prayer, we had our merienda. Unlike the previous day, the table was filled with laughter, fun and excitement. We learned more about ourselves. After our interactive merienda, we had the play, “Batang Rizal” by the Philippine Educational Theater Association (PETA). Lunch was as fun as merienda. We were also happy and we had our last lunch together as a team.

“EDSOR delegates can make a change” became the statement for the Statement T-Shirt making that happened. We were to make a t-shirt that summarized what we have learned these two days.

What a good thing to end the conference with God! We had a mass as one community. After the mass, the directress of ICA had her closing remarks. Then, the turnover ceremonies happened. The directress of ICA turned over the EDSOR flag to La Salle Greenhills.

Although we encountered a lot of problems and challenges, turned out that the biggest challenge we had was to say goodbye to our newfound friends. We had our last group picture taking together as schools and as groups and well, said bye, and we knew that we have found a new challenge: “To make a change!”