OP ED: Team Building Fun

By Nicole Vournazos, HG 2010

I can’t believe it’s been a whole year since we have all    seen each other! As I scan the crowd, I see lots of familiar faces. It seems like it was yesterday when we were all in Greece together: Cynthia was laying the wreath at  the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, Alexa was helping me practice my Greek, and Noël and I were exploring the beach.  Now, here we are seven years later.

There are many new friends in the crowd as well: friends from past year’s reunions. These are my new parea!  These are the parea I have met through listening to speakers talk about our proud history of Greece or through working on the oral history project for the National Hellenic Museum. And it doesn’t matter that we only just met, as I   get overwhelmed with questions: how are your brothers? How is California? And, perhaps my favorite, when are you coming over for dinner?

These are the exceptional friends I have met and bonded with through each year’s reunion. This year was no exception.In this year’s activity, we were split into teams and tasked with building the largest statute out of spaghetti (no easy feat!). If someone looked at us from afar, they’d think we had grown up with each other and known each other for years (which I can now proudly say that some of us have). Another reunion goes by and our friendships continue to grow!

With this in mind, I want to share our renewed mission: “We are the Heritage Greece Alumni Network, a distinguished association of young Greek American students and graduates that participated in the NHS Heritage Greece Program. We serve as ambassadors of Hellenic heritage by supporting the expansion of Heritage Greece and other programs that promote Hellenism and create rewarding opportunities for HG Alumni. Tobe part of the HG Alumni is to be part of the NHS family...”

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