Ryan (Current Ambassador)

“The most important thing I think Girl Scouts teaches girls is that whoever you are, it is okay to be yourself.”


13 years ago, Ryan’s mother, a former Girl Scout, learned that the girls at her child’s elementary school were creating a Girl Scout troop. It was then that she decided that her child would become a scout. He missed the meeting that year, so it was only next year that Ryan became a Brownie. Now, all these years later, Ryan is still a scout, now in Arizona.

When he moved to Arizona, Ryan found notable differences between the council there and the one he had previously been under in New York. Here, there were more girls who wanted to be in troops then leaders who wanted to lead troops. Thus, there was a waiting list to get into Girl Scouts.

Ryan’s first troop leaders were the type of people who believed that the most important aspect of Scouting was the craft aspect. They taught him how to sew, to make bracelets, to iron, to hot-glue, to fold things (like sleeping bags) and to cook. Ryan learned how to use a Dutch-oven to create pies, pizzas and more. This was an especially useful skill when he went camping.

His troop didn’t as much go camping as a troop as they went camping as friends. They would stay up late talking, telling stories and making boondoggles. However, Ryan’s favorite memory with his troop was visiting the Discovery Center. The scouts simply ran around, playing together and having fun.

Every year, Ryan’s troop takes part in a program called Troop to Troop, but they don’t do it the same way as the council does. Instead of taking donations with which the council sends cookies overseas to soldiers, they found soldiers from their area and asked their families if they could send them cookies. If the family said yes, they would send a care package with a note, Girl Scout cookies, and a few extra items.

Ryan didn’t earn his Bronze or Silver Award, but he is currently working on his Gold Award. Ryan’s plan for his Gold Award is to create a website for helping people who suffer from mental illness and self-injury. He says that a website such as the one he is creating would have been very beneficial him. He wants to fill the website with words of comfort, help, videos, methods to help resist urges, etc. Ryan says that as now, more people are aware of self-harm, he is not as afraid of confronting the stigma associated with it.

From his experiences with Girl Scouts and the world, Ryan has kept the values of leaving a place cleaner then he found it and helping anyone who seems to be in distress close to his heart. He tries to do everything in his power to make the world a better place. Everyone he meets, he treats as his equal, regardless of if they are two or hundred years old, they are all his equals.


Ryan can be found at his tumblr.

Correction: The original draft had Ryan under a different name and pronouns. As of 2015, Ryan came out as a transgender man and I decided to change the pronouns and name in this post to reflect that.

Satoko K-B. (Lifetime Girl Scout)

In 1978, Satoko when eight, the town neighboring hers started a Girl Scout troop. When her mother found the poster she signed Satoko up immediately and Satoko went to her first meeting. She remembers it well.

The first meeting was a sort of informational meeting. Besides one Brownie and her leader, everyone else there was as new as Satoko. Satoko remembers looking at the girl in the Brownie uniform and anticipating when she would get to wear that uniform. But before she was allowed to wear a uniform or say the promise, she and all the other girls had to learn what Girl Scouts was all about. They learned how to do a circle, as well as sing a few songs. One of the songs she learned that day was called Vista and she remembers it went something like “Free, Free Fly, Free Fly Flo, Vista, Kum-latta Kum-latta Kum-latta, Vista.”

Satoko’s new troop was called Troop 75 and she was part of it for almost twenty-years. She had to leave it because of a mishap though and she moved to a troop in Ebina, who accepted her. She has been with that troop over ten years now. All together she has been in Girl Scouts for thirty-five years. She currently lives in the United States, but she still registers as a troop leader in Japan. She is also currently on the board of the program Nobuko co-founded called GS-FOU Friends of US (FB). She joined a few years ago and she helps with Girl Scout camps, document translation and advice about American culture. Satoko is happy because even though she doesn’t currently live in Japan, she can still help the Japanese Girl Scout cause.

Satoko’s first Girl Scout camp out was in 1979. It was a spring camp and her troop stayed in a cottage. What made this experience special to Satoko was that is wasn’t only her first camp experience. All the girls with her were also having their first-time experiences. She also remembers her first primitive (tent) camping experience. It was like Kotoe’s experience in the fact that her campsite was on a hill with her tent at the top and the mess hall at the bottom.

When Satoko was a Ranger Scout (check bottom of index page) she applied for a Girl Scouts overseas program (called Wide Opportunity). She was selected as part of the delegation going to Pennsylvania. The main event of the program was called 1986 Arts Odyssey and it was hosted by the Talus Rock Girl Scout Council (now merged with the Girl Scout council of Western Pennsylvania). 1986 Arts Odyssey was a ten-day workshop. Each girl could take her pick of what type of classes she could attend (Dance, Drama, Visual Art, ect.). Satoko chose the visual arts class. She spent her ten days in painting classes, sculpture classes, design sketching classes and more. At the end of the program, her and the other eighty girls showed off their work at an exposition. After the program, Satoko spent four weeks in San Francisco.

During and after the program, Satoko was staying with a host family. At that time, Satoko couldn’t speak much English and understood less then fifty-percent of what the host family told her. Luckily her host family was generous and patient. They didn’t mind repeating what they said and they sometimes drew pictures for communication. At that time Satoko often carried a Japanese-English dictionary around. She is still in contact with her old host family and sometimes they visit each other or do Girl Scout exchanges together.

When Satoko was an active troop leader in Japan, she tried to share some of she learned in the United States with her troop. She played chain games, she taught them American Girl Scout songs by removing the lyrics and adding clapping, she taught them a game called “Merry-go-round” (description in comment at the bottom) and how to make SWAPS. According to Satoko, Japanese people are traditionally good with working with their hands so things like macramé pencil boxes and dog are really easy for them. However the girls were intrigued by the American s’more SWAP and marshmallow on a stick SWAP.

In 2000, Satoko’s host family invited her to help them run a camp with their council as part of the outdoor staff. At the camp Satoko taught girls origami and Japanese style writing. Another camp Satoko helped at in 2010 was a Japanese Girl Scout camp that was celebrating the 90^th anniversary of Girl Scouting in Japan. The camp had girls from over fourteen different countries. In the beginning the Japanese girls were very shy with the new girls, but by the end they were begging them not to leave since they had become such fast friends.

Satoko helps to encourage young Japanese Girl Scouts to branch out and have confidence in themselves. If Satoko had not become a Girl Scout her life would be very different from what it is today. She would not have moved to the United States, she would not have met her husband and she would not have many of the friends she has today.

Japanese Girl Scout Fact: They don’t have a Bronze, Silver or Gold Award. Instead they have something called the B-P (Baden-Powell) Award (it used to be the B-P Trophy). To win this Award, Ranger scouts do a project and they send a report of their project in for a council review. If the council approves it they get the Award

Diana S. (Past Girl Scout, Age 10 - ?)

Many years after Diana graduated from high school and got married, she took a trip to Georgia. While she was in Georgia she got to see something that reminded her of her time in Girl Scouts, she got to see the Wayne-Gordon House or the birthplace of Juliette Lowe.

When Diana was ten, the group of friends she hung out with decided to become a troop and that was the beginning of her Girl Scout career. Diana’s troop kept themselves together throughout the first few years of high school, and then they disbanded.

From that time, Diana remembers earning badges for sewing and cooking, as well as getting her green vest and selling cookies.

Like most people, her favorite Girl Scout cookie is the Thin Mint, but she still fondly remembers the cookies she sold when she was a scout. She recalls the chocolate cookie with white filling (Oxfords/Chalet Crèmes) that is now retired and the ever-popular Trefoil cookies. Compared to the cookies that existed when Diana was a Girl Scout, today’s cookies seem healthier in comparison, but lack the same amount of butter and sugar that Diana remembers in her cookies.

She also remembers that her troop went camping. They started out in someone’s back yard, cooking s’mores over the fire. Later, they began to travel to the Girl Scout House in Catalina. The Girl Scout house was large dorm with a cooking faculty. The dorm was like a classroom with bare bunks. They would spend a lot of their summer there.

None of her children were Scouts when they were young, but Diana still remembers the qualities of honor and truthfulness that Girl Scouts taught her.

Special Post: How Girl Scouting (and Guiding) Originally Started & Why Japanese Girl Scouts Are Not Called Girl Guides (An Extra Story From the Interview of Nobuko A.)

Boy Scouts started before Girl Scouts. It was founded by Lord Baden-Powell in 1907 when he took a group of boys camping on Brownsea. A year after that Lord Baden-Powell published his book Scouting for Boys and Boy Scouts took off.

In 1909, Lord Baden-Powell held a Jamboree for Boy Scouts at the Crystal Palace in London. He was surprised to see a group of girls marching among his Boy Scouts. He asked them who they were and they said they were Girl Scouts. Baden-Powell thought that scouting was for boys so he had his sister Agnes Baden-Powell help him found Girl Guiding.

At that time, Juliette Lowe had a company of Girl Guides in Scotland. She liked the idea of Girl Guiding so much she wanted to take it back to her home country (the USA) under the name of Girl Scouting. So she talked with Lord and Lady Baden-Powell and brought the practice home to the United States.

In 1919, Girl Guiding started in Japan. However it was banned during World War II. In 1945, it was was reinstated by General MacArthur because he thought that "Democracy must lead for the youth." He encouraged ex-Girl Guide leaders to start a new movement (as Girl Scouts) and that is why Japanese Scouts are called Girl Scouts and not Girl Guides.

Nobuko's interview is here.

Jaimee C. (Past Girl Scout and Current Leader)

Jaimee always tries her best to be “honest and helpful.” She is always “responsible for what [she] says and [does]” and she definitely “[respects] authority.”

Did you notice that I was quoting the Girl Scout Law? That’s because the things mentioned above are all things Jaimee learned as a Girl Scout.

Jaimee’s troop leader was a good mentor; she was very structured and organized. She always had something to do or teach. She led their troop to learn how to bake cupcakes, earn their sewing badge, making fire starters, cooking over an open flame and doing community service (outreaches to the local Boys and Girls Club where they would help underprivileged children).

Jaimee’s favorite part of Girl Scouts was definitely Girl Scout camp. Her troop would all pack up their mess-kits and clothes in their suitcases and then hit the road to camp. When they finally got to camp they would separate and each of them would go to their assigned cabin. The cabins were on raised platforms and each carried six bunks. The cabins were spread in different camps all over the main camp and lake area, but they all shared the same mess hall.

At the mess hall, their meals were like this; breakfast was always something simple like cereal, at lunch they would make their own sandwiches and at dinner it would always be a big dish that was cooked in bulk (like pasta). They would also have campfires where they would eat s'mores.

By doing Girl Scouts, Jaimee gained many valuable skills for life and she also gained a greater appreciation for friendship. If she hadn’t done Girl Scouts, her life might not be the same.

Angie H. (Past Girl Scout and Troop Leader)

A group of girls dances garbed in vibrant clothing. Their hands and feet swirl in time to the Tarentella. The crowd at the church goes wild. The girls are around all around 13-15 years old, among them is Angie in a dress she handmade especially for the occasion.

Angie was a Girl Scout in the 1940s. It is 2013 now and Angie doesn’t remember much from her time at Girl Scouts  besides earning a few badges, going to some court of awards ceremonies and dancing the Tarentella with her troop. Angie’s memories are more intact however when it comes to around 10 years later when she was the troop leader for a collection of girls in upstate New York.

It all started when a mother at Angie’s church came up with an idea. She wanted to form a Brownie troop and wanted Angie to be her co-leader. Neither of them had had any prior experience of Girl Scouting (besides Angie’s few years as a Girl Scout) so they did it all "by the book". They told the 27 7-yearolds what was expected of them as Brownies, which were things like “You always have to have a ‘Brownie taste’ before you say you dislike something” and "You should follow the 'Brownie Way'."

When they first started, Angie’s troop didn’t have any uniforms yet, so they came in whatever clothes they wanted, which more often then not turned out to be a copy of whatever their leaders had worn the last meeting. It all started on the day when Angie went to the meeting wearing a little scarf; the next meeting all the little Brownies came in wearing scarves. This went on until they finally got their uniforms. They used to all attend mass on Sundays together in uniform so that everyone knew that they were the local Brownie troop and later, the Girl Scout troop.

When the troop used to travel to places like the park they would always have to scrunch together in cars, with about 9 people per car. The troop’s favorite car to ride in was Angie’s blue and white Ford Convertible. With 5 girls in the back seat and 3 girls in the front with Angie, Angie definitely thinks that the police of today would have been on her case for safety reasons.

Angie also remembers the first time she took the girls camping. They went out to a big one-room cabin in March. It was so cold that there was snow still frozen around the cabin area.

The good news for the girls was that their dinner was a hot dish called Brownie Stew. However, Angie remembers one little girl who did not take the Brownie Stew as welcome news.

Little Girl: Remember, I don’t like onions!

Angie: We’ll see about that. You probably won’t even know they are in there. They are not in there, they are not in there.

After the girl walked away Angie continued on with the recipe, added onions and fed the girls the stew.

Little Girl: I can taste the onions.

Angie: Do you like it? Do you think it tastes good?

Little Girl: It’s okay…

Angie: You see what you’ve done. You’ve tasted it. You’ve had your Brownie taste and you like it. So now, don't tell me you don’t like onions because you do like onions.

When it was time for the girls to go to bed after dinner, Angie had them unroll their pre-made bedrolls (not sleeping bags) and they changed into their pajamas in the cold air.

Angie and the other leader had made the girls change in the cold air to teach them the Brownie way, but Angie remembers that she, the other leader and the mothers decided to  cheat and just went to sleep in their clothes. Luckily they woke up earlier then the girls so that the girls were none the wiser. They were only staying one night so after the girls woke up, they packed and boarded the cars.

Angie and her family left New York for California 5 years later and that was the end of her time as a troop leader of 27 girls. She still thinks that saying yes to being a troop leader was one of the best choices she ever made.