I hate feeling sorry for people because I hate people feeling sorry for me. I believe that in life you get what you put into it. Now of course there is exceptions when you play with the most energetic kids in a small church in New Orleans.

I've never seen such a graceful town where you actually feel appreciated. A town that whenever you walk into a fast food restaurant they greet you excitement and expression, pouncing on the counter instead of a minimum wage greet exploiting their unhappiness at work. They are not scripted greeters performing the same task with every customer that rings the bell on the door when walking in.

Anyhow, the people really lift up your spirit and it made you happy to give to the people who unfortunately barely have enough for themselves. I had the pleasure to work with a group of students who had embarked from many places all over the states through a Leadership Ambassador Program, People to People, to Louisiana in order to give back to a community they weren't even apart of for a week. We started off in an abandoned church; in fact, I wasn't even aware that it was a church until the instructor noted us that it was.

It's as if the best directors of Hollywood were cropping a setting for a horror movie with such destructed and lonely scenery. Suddenly, kids came running out towards us like chickens with their head cut off. If there would have been a red carpet, we could've been deemed celebrities with all the praise received from the kids. "Can you play with me?" questioned the children. "We'll help you paint" they added. They had started started a car without a key and quickly obtained my devotion to help them.

We grabbed buckets, rags, brushes, paint, rollers,  and all the essentials for painting but yet still had too much hands. I got the pleasure of painting with a kid named Marcel. "I bet I could paint faster than you!" Little kid was a competitor so I told him "if you win I'll buy you ice cream."
"Any kind?"
"You name it."

The horses were on their marks,the gunner had shot the start, and we were off to the race. He painted right, left, up, down, cutting wind making sounds of "whoosh" with the brush so uncoordinatedly that he started getting weary.

I actioned the sibling play, the type of way in which you play in favor of your siblings giving them a fair chance to win, so I got on my knees and disputed the race fairly. He was so into rolling the roller he'd spin it too hard and it would sputter all over his shirt. Kid had almost left half a gallon of paint on his shirt. It had me thinking whether we could squeeze out the excess paint on his shirt back into the gallon.

Yes I was losing, but his painting was so bad it could have been effortlessly compared with those blurred paintings in history that have some symbolic meaning to them. I couldn't interfere with his ego letting him know that he was doing it wrong. Marcel was feeling himself and shoved me out of the way to finish my section of wall too. I was bullied with his love for his home.

The church was all the kid had. It was his luxury. It was his playhouse. It was his privilege and he cared for it greatly. I caught myself thinking what his lifestyle with his parents were but shuddered off the images of his household because he didn't need pity, he wanted someone to play with.

I was a loser that day with no excuses. He had heart to paint. I couldn't steal his internal trophy from him. I had to be the best loser. I had to pick him up and spin him around. Although after a while of doing so, you'll get a state fair line of kids lining up for the joy ride as well but it's worth it, they were.

The next day, I remembered him knowing that he might have forgotten me, but he hadn't. He clearly remembered me and ran to show me his clean shirt. He had washed or intended to wash off the paint himself. He laughed giggling as if it had been his first good laugh in a long time. I just smiled at him looking past his saddening situation and admired him as a person. I presented a box of ice cream to him and he did what most today don't do. The little ice cream he had, Marcel shared.