When I was accepted to the 2006 District 5630's RYLA camp, I knew I was in for a great experience, but I never imagined what a powerful stepping-stone that camp would become. Feeling adventurous, I signed up to be considered as a representative for International RYLA after hearing last year's participant, Waco Phipps,talk about his experience. A phone call, an interview, and an acceptance letter later, I found myself preparing for the long drive to Salt Lake City for International RYLA 2007.

On June 13th., I joined 90 other participants, ages 18 - 30, for a remarkable four-day session. Over 20 countries were represented including Australia, New Zealnd, Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong, England, the French West Indies, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Norway, Iceland, Sweden, Greece, Nigeria, Ghana, Canada, Brazil, Sri Lanka, India, Romania, and the United States. Between the leadership activities, the international elements, and the people involved, I can honestly say I came away a different person.

Throughout the Convention, I heard several different speakers and participated in numerous leadership and character building activities. One of the first speakers was Ken Robertshaw from England, who taught the 6 C's of leadership:courage, confidence, charisma, commitment, character and communication. Ken also presented the unique analogy of Johari's Box. Brian Anderson, the chair of the RYLA International Convention, discussed accountability and how it affects leaders. In his speech he stressed that it isn't what happens to you that really counts, it's the way you react to it that defines the true character of your leadership. Diane Kessel, co-chair of the convention, emphasized Brian's words in her speech about leading by example through teaching this quote:"Your talk talks and your walk talks, but your walk talks louder than your talk talks". In laymen terms, a leader's actions always speak louder than their words.

Other speakers included Gert Danielson from Norway, who talked about being a Global Citizen and using nonviolent communication skills, which he learned during his experiences as a Rotary PEACE Scholar in Argentina. We also received a visit from Rotary International's President, Bill Boyd, whose grandsons were RYLA participants and became good friends of mine. Multimillionaire Sonny Brown also spoke saying"the amount of good one person can do is limitless as long as they don't care who get the credit". To combat the many obstacles we face in life he suggested that we CARE - care about our character, attitude, respect and enthusiasm. While I thoroughly enjoyed his speech, Mr. Brown really caught my attention when he starting talking about the power of RYLA and mentioned District 5630 RYLA. As a Texas Rotarian, he contributed to the start of this very RYLA and even said, "That RYLA camp in District 5630 is one of the finest programs in the country that I know of." The fact that he specifically mentioned our district to people from all over the world was quite a compliment.

Another amazing speaker was Jerry Traylor. Born with cerebral palsy, Mr. Traylor has encountered several hardships throughout his life, yet has achieved some remarkable feats including involvement in numerous marathons (regardless of the fact that it took him 7 hours and 17 minutes to run his first ever 26-mile race), Dance 'til you Drop marathons, mountain races and more. However, his most impressive feat was running across the United States from San Francisco to New York. Throughout his entire presentation he made jokes and had us all laughing. While Jerry had several motivational sayings, my favorite was "Strive for excellence, leave perfection to God."

One of the leadership activities that was very unique was the reenactment of United Flight 232, a plane that experienced mechanical difficulties in mid-flight back in 1989. Forced to land or crash, United Flight 232 contacted ground support in Iowa and the train of commands and assistance began. Yet, in the midst of this adversity, numerous people joined together and, using their "Collective Potential,: turned a seemingly hopeless situation into a successful outcome. At RYLA we drew a slip of paper that described a real person's name and occupation from the actual event and created a timeline of what actions we felt were needed to best assist those in the air and organize help below. Once we established our planof attack, we compared our actions to those of the real individuals and events.

During the entire convention, several international differences were apparent. Examples included accents, slang, appearance, conduct, cultural behavior and food choices. The diversity of the many cultures added to the topics discussed in our breakout sessions and it was amazing to hear the different views of leadership that each country had displays representing their country and each gave a presentation with several groups wearing ceremonial dress. Presentations included a ceremonial dance from Indial, folding origami shapes from Japan, writing RYLA in Hong Kong manuscript, seeing a "haka" dance, the ceremonial dance of the Maori tribes to intimidate competition, performed by New Zealanders, learning a Swedish dance, seeing a power point of pictures of the landscape in Greece, Sri Lanka, Romania and more. As the convention was in Utah, RYLA participants also toured the Temple Square and heard about Morman pioneers, listed to the famous Mormon Choir,introduced foreigners to the concept of an American rodeo, and watched fellow participants give American dorm food a try. We also watched a Maori trip from New Zealand perform ceremonial dances at the opening session for the International Rotary Convention and participated in the Convention's activities and sessions.

Above all else, what made RYLA the most life changing were the people. RYLA was a rare opportunity to have a casual mesh of interactions between continents. Despite age and both obvious and subtle cultural differences, all the participants had a good time. I don't think that there was ever a single night that any of us went to bed before 2 a.m. After all of the programs, the nights were spent playing Texas Hold 'Em with Monopoly money, trying to teach people who disn't speak English very well to play charades, long chats, lots of jokes, and, my favorite, dancing.

I still don't know if I can comprehend what RYLA did or fully put into words the awesome experience I had. Working with peers who are leaders not only at home, but also internationally is a remarkable and almost indescribable opportunity. RYLA allowed me to establish strong connections all over the world. I am planning to visit New Zealand this winter if possible.

While unexpectedly participating in the famous International RYLA Speak-Off, I challenged the group with another "C" of leadership: Choice. I emphasized that this was a remarkable experience and that it was up to each one of the participants to use this experience. We could either let it fade into a nice picture on memory lane, or we could vocalize the things we learned and encourage other to participate. We alone had the choice of how we would use this rare opportunity.

Sonny Brown stated that we have a great District RYLA program and I agree whole-heartedly, but I will leave that opinion for you and encourage all Rotarians and students alike to become involved in the RYLA experience for him or herself.