The following is an excerpt from the travel journal of Camille Kappelman, an eighth grader at The Harbor School who recently traveled with her class to Mexico.

Every year, The Harbor School takes off a week to explore different parts of Washington, the U.S. and some even get to see countries out of the U.S. We get to see different customs, beliefs and a totally different way of living.

This year there were many options, and one was a trip to Mexico. Twelve kids got to go to Guadalajara, spend time experiencing markets, people, and getting to spend time with classmates. The most important part of this trip, though, was to raise money for Casa Hogar Nacidos para Triunfar.

Casa Hogar, a children’s shelter in Mexico, is where about 150 children live. They go to school, eat and sleep in one large building. The goal of the trip: to make a difference in these children’s lives. Twelve Harbor School students spent about two months preparing to go down. We raised money washing cars, selling doughnuts and having a Mercado (Latin Market) at our school, and it was all worth it.

When we got to the shelter there were maybe 50 young kids running around. They were laughing and playing and tackling each other and crying and pushing and shoving. We all got introduced, and then little hands that so wanted us to pick them as their buddies pulled each of us away one by one.

Every day we went there, and all we did was play and play and take pictures and give piggyback rides. It was all frenzy and chaos, but they loved us, wanted us there; and it felt so good to be there with them and help them and play.

Every day it was the same, and finally on the last day we gave them the money we had raised — money to help them build their own school. When we showed them how much we had made, a great feeling came over us, we felt so good. But the most rewarding part was really just sitting with the kids to play.”