To all WAIT friends and family:

Although our lives are busy with tight schedules and new challenges, we can always take the time to make a difference in someone else's life. Never underestimate your own ability to change your surroundings by being who you are. While many of us have to take on jobs to support ourselves and our families, we can always take with us our spirit of service and family and spread it to others.

Washington AIDS International Teens

WAIT teaches people of all ages, races, religions, and cultures about the science of HIV. We advocate getting tested, living abstinent until a lifetime partnership, and good health care for those infected. We teach through the performing arts and other talents and skills, including electronic media and communication. WAIT works with anyone wishing to stop to AIDS in their communities and across the globe.

Reflections on a Year of Service :

The WAIT Team Year-of-Service began in July, 2006, when several teenagers dedicated their time and energy to use their passions to stopping AIDS. During this time, we taught in 17 different states and 5 countries to bring WAIT's life-saving message and to equip others to do the same. While in Washington , we did most of our work out of the Tsubata's home, and learned about ourselves and each other, as well as the world. So what have we gained from this experience thus far? Four of the eight WAIT trainers share their realizations here.

Josh de Groot: This year has helped me learn what's most important in life: our relationships with family and others. Only through true, honest love will AIDS be stopped. The most difficult experience was home rotation: we were each asked to go back to our homes and serve our families and communities. From that, I learned making the world a better place begins with yourself and those closest to you. With each “impossible” challenge that I succeeded in conquering, I prepared myself to be a better future husband and father. When I go past the tendency to be complacent, I help resolve suffering for others. 

Mike Ferrete: I never expected my year after high school to feel so fulfilling. My goals for the year quickly became realities and I realized how powerful our actions are. Things were not always easy but I managed to overcome myself which was the hardest part. Doing things ultimately for others and for public purposes helped me to understand my role as part of a community and helped me understand my own family better. My only hope is that I can uphold this lifestyle of servitude as a way of life that can revolutionize the culture and ultimately ease the desperation of this world.

Joshua Herstein : One of the coolest experiences I've had on the Year of Service was during the Great Lakes Tour, when we performed at a school in Detroit , Michigan . The audience was about 100 middle schoolers, and when we invited them up for the final act, they all totally rushed onto the stage and started dancing. That sort of crazy response is something I had never seen before, and the coolest part was after it was done and we were explaining that they can join the state's new team, just about all of them went for the sign-up sheet, so the line stretched out all the way around the gymnasium.

Christella Hardman: Through my various experiences, I have been gaining insight into world situations, human nature, spirit, the power of love, sincerity, and selflessness, and into myself. I have gotten over previous insecurities of singing in public, fundraising, and standing up for abstinence. I am extremely grateful for my internship with WAIT this semester. I have never desired to change the world as much as I have since doing WAIT, nor have I felt as empowered to do so. I am inspired by, fully support and believe, and have seen the power of, the WAIT message of every person selflessly using their talents to contribute to the world, particularly in stopping the spread of HIV/AIDS and, at the same time, standing up for the value of human life and creating a revolution in the performing arts and in the use and purpose of love. In whatever I do in life, I hope to live this message and to not be afraid to be as powerful and loving as I can be. 

Local News

WAIT in the Home Community
By Mike Ferrete

In an effort to help the kids of the West Lanham Hills community, the WAIT team has been teaching classes to teach hip-hop, gymnastics and breakdancing. Several team members help in the effort. Apart from teaching dance and different movements, values and ethics are taught in an effort to help them not only in the class but also for everything else in their lives. Uncle Kazuo has taught many of the community youth to do flips, handsprings, roundoffs and other skills. 

Kevin Asonglefac, a University of Maryland graduate, has been helping and serving as a very positive role model to the young people.  He arranged for them to be special guests at two of the annual Gymkana at UMD where his college team demonstrates advanced gymnastic skills as a way of messaging against drug use, alcohol and smoking. 

While the neighbor kids are learning exciting skills, they are also becoming aware of the WAIT team and what we do. We have had trainings which several of the kids have attended and have joined WAIT.  We now have 5 regular local team members from our direct community. 

Although it has been a big commitment to teach 3 classes each week, this has helped bring the community together and help the kids to spend their time doing positive activities. Instead of doing photo-op public service, teaching classes like these helps create a regular interaction with a community, and to help kids have good social relationships that encourage positive life choices. 

Japan Encounters WAIT
By Joshua de Groot

On Friday, May 18^th, the WAIT team performed at the Grand Hyatt Hotel for an all-Japanese audience of about 40 people, including company presidents and other important representatives visiting for the 25^th anniversary celebration of the Washington Times. Uncle Kazuo and Aunt Kate Tsubata introduced WAIT, in both English and Japanese, explaining how WAIT was started.  Despite the exhaustion of jetlag and their busy schedules, the group responded enthusiastically to the HIV skit, performed with Uncle Kazuo narrating in Japanese, as Mie Smith prompted in English.  The audience laughed and responded to each word and action.

I introduced the song “Hero,” partially in Japanese, expressing that we felt that they are heroes for sacrificially working to support the world. Mie spoke about the message of waiting for one’s true love, in “Wait for Me,”and  Kensei introduced “Desert Rose,” pledging with tears to an equally teary audience that we will take responsibility to end AIDS.  As we finished with our hands reaching to heaven, many people were sobbing openly.

As we spoke to the wonderful people afterwards and took some photos, we saw how beautiful their hearts are.  This was significant to me personally because I have Japanese ancestry, and I felt great pride in knowing that people there would find it important and quietly give so much of their heart and resources to make a positive impact on the US and the world.  Heroes exist in every country, and I felt we met the heroes of Japan

Share your heart! Contact us on what you think!

E-mail: info@waitteam.org

Phone: (301) 577-1094

Address: 7752 Decatur Rd., Hyattsville, MD 20784