Sunburns

Happy America Day!  This was by far one of my most interesting 4th of July's, probably because I spent it just with my friends and we did what we wanted to do.  We went to the beach for the majority of the day on a Brown-planned trip, and although it was fun, we were there for a little too long.  We spent six hours on the beach, and there is really only so much you can do to have fun and not get sunburned.  I was much better at the former than the latter.  I received a nasty burn on both my legs below the knee because I forgot to keep putting on sunscreen there.  The rest of my body is relatively fine.  The worst part is that I have no idea how I'm going to sleep tonight, as, whenever something touches my leg, it burns.

After the beach, after nursing my burns for a while, Niels and our new friends went down to Indian Point Park, by the water, and watched a fantastic fireworks show.  It was amazing in part because we were so close.  The boat they were being launched from was no more than two hundred yards away, so the fireworks looked spectacular, and Nicole, who had never seen fireworks before, was absolutely speechless.  It is still astounding to me, meeting people who have never experienced things that I consider so mundane.  I have been all over the world, but I have never had this kind of opportunity to get to know people so well and it has really opened my eyes to the differences in people who really don't seem all that different.  If anything, that will be what I take away the most from this program.