Hectic 2 Weeks: The Grand Opening And Cas Night

It’s been definitely a wild 2 weeks for the youth center, a lot has happened in just a short amount of time but everything was extremely successful and turned out amazing. Last week, we had our grand opening which was on November 10th, a lot of people from different communities had shown up and the event was successful, and we were able to recognize the amount of hard work that put into this project on the night of the opening. The week after that was CAS night, which is an event taken place at a restaurant (Seasons); this event is taken place to present and summarize about the purpose of your project and some background information for the community to further understand what the project is for and how it gives back to the community. The event was successful but very nerve-racking and very stressful, these past two weeks might have hectic but were definitely worth it and turned out successfully.

Grand Opening:

The Grand Opening was definitely one of the biggest challenges specially when there is a short amount of time before the opening, making sure that everything is prepared and organized correctly takes a lot of time and courage. When I was in the process of planning the grand opening, which was a few weeks back, I was pretty confident and thought that everything was going to be ready in time. This caused me to leave some work to the end which is what caused chaos on the day of the opening. The main problem the youth center and the space has dealt with was cleanliness, our space would get dirty so easily due the leaves that are being blown into the space and dirt as well. We have cleaned the space multiple times and it still finds a way to become dirty again. This was big problem we’ve had to deal with but we managed and pulled through. Making sure we received donations for our raffle that was going to be taken place at our youth center was extremely challenging because Jade and I were in charge of going around the Tamarindo Community, and ask different businesses if they were wiling to donate any of their products for our raffle, a lot of businesses turned it down but we received a solid amount of donations which was successful. While having all these different factors affect the planning of this opening, it became extremely stressful because the opening would get closer which allowed us to feel more stressed. The stressed feeling that we all had made us move forward and get more things done in a short amount of time which lead us to succeed for our grand opening. The day of the opening was very hectic and unorganized at the youth center, but once we pulled it off and more people showed up than expected and we were so ecstatic on how it turned out!

During the planning of this opening, it was extremely stressful but what motivated me to move forward was the people that supported and made me reach my fullest potential. Without the support of my team members and staff I wouldn’t of been able to make it, they are the ones that truly made this happen and their positivity is what motivated me to reach the goal of pulling off a successful event for the opening. The feeling of accomplishing such a big project, something so amazing, something that will give and help the community, that is created by yourself is your motivation. I’ve created a youth center which is what our community needs, knowing that this project will be so helpful and beneficial to our community is what motivates me to move forward and try my best. I have put so much hard work into this project, and knowing the amount of work everyone has put in, how amazing this project will turn out, that’s what kept me going, those are the reasons that motivated me for the times I was insecure. I am so happy with the final results and the outcome of the opening!

CAS NIGHT:

CAS Night is an event in which involves the presentation of your CAS project, students have to mention and talk about the main purpose of their project and how does it pay back to the community specifically in a creative way, in an active way and service. Parents and people from different communities are welcome to come and listen to the presentations that are being presented.

How was CAS night a challenge? Me as a person I don’t enjoy speaking in public and public speaking is something I am not necessarily good at which is why this event was a challenge for me. I had so many thoughts and feelings rushing through my head before I was going to get on stage and start presenting, “what if I fall?, what if I mess up?, what if I forget a word?” All these thoughts would come into my mind and that would cause stress, being stressed before a presentation isn’t good, and I thought that I was going to mess the presentation up so badly because I was so insecure and I am aware that public speaking is definitely not my forte. Once I got on stage, and started presenting it was definitely nerve-racking at first but once I got the hang of it, I eased into a little more and the crowd really seemed to enjoy the presentation which made me feel more comfortable. Throughout the presentation, everything was going great and I became much more comfortable presenting because I knew that my project was successful and I had put so much hard work into it that what was the point in me being nervous about something so amazing!

It was extremely successful, despite how nervous I was before and during the presentation, I was still able to move forward and succeed my public speaking, as I felt more comfortable and had the support of my team members during the presentation, everything started feeling more relaxed and I got the hang of it. After the presentation, parents came up to me, congratulating me for my hard work and the way I presented my CAS project. That made me feel so confident and made me realize that I had put so much hard work into this presentation that it was all worth the stress and worrying. At the end of the day, the hard work and the pain that was put into this project was for a reason, this youth center is to bring communities and teenagers together, a safe place in which teenagers can feel comfortable and happy which is what Tamarindo and other communities need at the moment, instead of not moving forward and finding solutions, we should take into consideration about the problems that are occurring in our community and find solutions that could prevent these problems. This youth center will prevent the unsocial and unhappy teenagers, and change that insecurity into positive confidence through social interactions between teenagers! Terraza is here to promote health and entertainment.