Alida sees community as a responsibility—showing up for events, contributing to growth, and being part of solutions, even with limited means. A poet and spoken word artist, she brought to the Collective a gift for transforming experiences into words that resonate. In her blog, she reflected on her first encounters with India’s energy and diversity, seeing parallels with her own hopes for cultural exchange and collaboration. Coming from a community already grappling with extreme heat and natural disasters, Alida connected climate challenges back home with what she witnessed on the trip. Through poetry slams and creative expression, she carried the essence of the journey—learning, sharing, and collaborating—as tools to drive awareness and change. For her, India was not just a dream destination but also a stage to imagine new ways of linking art with activism.