This article, written by Aaron Leonard, was orginially published in Homeland Magazine and is republished on our blog with permission.
Amine Tourki grew up in Morocco, moving to Brooklyn at age 15 after his father, a longtime member of the Sierra Club, won an immigration lottery at the U.S. Consulate in Casablanca.
Amine’s brief stint with the U.S. Army began in the Summer of 2007, after he left the University of Michigan to accept a position as an Arabic interpreter in Iraq. This would become a life changing experience for Amine, one that he has spent the last decade trying to heal from.
In Iraq, Amine was assigned to a US Special Forces unit, working with a Green Beret A-Team during the most violent period of Operation Iraqi Freedom. In the four months Amine worked for the Green Berets, he saw the effects of war on the people and the land, experiences that would eventually drive Amine to resign and return to his Brooklyn home.
Ten years after returning from Iraq, Amine works as a programmer and Uber driver in New York City. To help firm-up a sense of purpose in his life, Amine joined a local veteran service organization called Mission Continues in Brooklyn, where he volunteers with veterans in his community.
While the volunteer projects are deeply rewarding, Amine often felt there was something missing. He’d dreamed of adventure in the wild, read the histories of New York’s parks, and decided it was time to explore the great outdoors.
The problem was, other than local parks, he had no confidence in his ability to safely explore outside the city. Amine has never slept outside, has never backpacked, never had to carry everything he needed to survive.
As Paulo Coelho so aptly wrote in The Alchemist, “And when you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it.” One day Amine got an email from Mission Continues, an open invitation to join the Sierra Club Military Outdoors on an outing called “How to Backpack from New York City: Hoboken to Harriman State Park.” Amine saw his opportunity to explore and signed-on to take his first hesitant steps to get outside.
This history of military and veteran engagement dates to its founder, John Muir, who in 1903 guided President Theodore Roosevelt into the Yosemite wilderness, creating Sierra Club’s first “military outing.”
The tradition of supporting the military was best illustrated when the Sierra Club’s first full-time executive director, David Brower, responded to the need for an alpine fighting force during WWII. Brower and Club leaders used the mountaineering and skiing skills they developed with the Sierra Club to found and train the 10th Mountain Division - a unit that has distinguished itself from the Dolomites of Italy to the Hindu Kush of Afghanistan.
Brower himself fought with the 10th Mountain in WWII, earning a Bronze Star for action in Italy. Since its creation in 2006 within the Sierra Club Outdoors, the Military Outdoors program has facilitated outdoor adventures for more than 70,000 veterans and their families.
The Sierra Club Military Outdoors was established in 2006 as a volunteer led program, continuing a long tradition within the Sierra Club of supporting the needs of military members. In New York City, the program is led by Aaron Leonard, a retired U.S. Army Officer, and a handful of dedicated volunteers.
The mission is simple: to help veterans explore, enjoy, and protect the lands they swore an oath to protect. Aaron began his role as a student veteran coordinator in December 2016, tasked with establishing a Military Outdoors program in the Northeast.
With a population of over 220,000 veterans, New York City was clearly the city to begin this project, and hosting weekend outings to nearby state parks was a great way to get veterans involved. In signing up for this June’s backpacking trip, Amine was definitely outside his comfort zone. As the day approached where he would meet up with the group in Hoboken he nearly dropped from the trip. The packing list alone was intimidating: 40+ degree sleeping bag, no cotton, outer layer, inner layer, all foreign to a man who bravely answered a call to serve in a war zone.
But as Amine was to discover, we can learn a lot about ourselves when we explore the world outside our comfort zones. The Sierra Club’s mission is to help people explore, enjoy, and protect the planet. This work has never been more important.
According to a 2001 survey sponsored by the EPA and published in the Journal of Exposure Analysis and Environmental Epidemiology, Americans spend 87 percent of their time indoors and 6 percent in an enclosed vehicle.
A survey published by The Nature Conservancy, Connecting America’s Youth to Nature, reports “The key obstacles to youth spending time in nature are lack of access, lack of interest, and feelings of discomfort.” Helping Amine and others like him to enjoy their first-time backpacking is essential.
Amanda Gordon, an active Air Force Reservist who recently returned from a six-month deployment to Kuwait, is not unlike Amine. Having spent little time outdoors growing up, Amanda was looking for a way to re-connect with herself and her life away from the Air Force.
A chance invite through her mother’s coworker lead her to join the Sierra Club Military Outdoors on an earlier backpacking trip to the Shenandoah Valley in April 2017, where she spent a week with Aaron, three other veterans, and Sierra Club volunteer Zia Onorato, a Social Worker in Connecticut and her mom’s friend from work.
Amanda had returned from her deployment feeling anger and bitterness. When Amanda shared her story, she said “I was angry about my experience, or lack of experience, and was relieved to get out of Kuwait. I was ready to get on with my civilian life.” Amanda knew that she wanted to go back to college and study journalism. She also knew that she would need to make a transition from her military life while returning to a civilian life that felt foreign. She was looking for a life that held a sense of purpose.
Helping veterans like Amanda transition from a military lifestyle to a healthy and purposeful civilian lifestyle isn’t just an elevator pitch, it accurately describes the work being done by the Military Outdoors’ network of volunteer leaders.
After returning from her trip, Amanda said “I never considered getting outdoors or camping, but going to Shenandoah with the other veterans was awesome.” She enjoyed being on a team again, but without the hierarchy and issues that were ever present during her deployment. Much like Amine, Amanda was outside her comfort zone on day one of her first Military Outdoors trip. But once in the backcountry of Shenandoah, Amanda had an experience that stuck with her. “We got far enough away to see no distractions, hear no cars or city noise, just you and nature.” When asked if there was one place she wanted to explore, she said “I want to see as much as I can.”
Recently Amanda joined Amine, Aaron and five other New Yorkers for the first in a series of Sierra Club Military Outdoors outings aptly titled “How to Backpack from New York City: Hoboken to Harriman State Park.” There were other veterans on the trip, and a few civilians. Some were members of the Sierra Club, and some had only heard of our Nation’s oldest, largest, and most effective environmental advocacy organization. There was one commonality: everyone was looking for something they felt was missing in their lives. An accessible introduction to getting outdoors.
When asked of his experience after the trip, Amine said “A fantastic program, more than going on a day hike. We get to spend more time together, feel more comfortable with the group. A more wholesome way of bonding with people that have been with you in the trenches. As a New Yorker, I heard of these parks (Harriman) but had no idea how to get there or what to do there.”
When asked to describe the difference between his time with the Sierra Club Military Outdoors and other veterans’ groups in the city, Amine said “Here you must work within a team, carry food and water, it puts you in touch with nature and a network of people you want to spend time with. There is a difference between having drinks with Veterans on Wall Street and sleeping next to another veteran in the wilderness. Cooking, hiking, making clean water, totally different.”
Veterans and family members who wish to go beyond just participating in trips to becoming leaders can join a Sierra Club Sponsored Outings Leader Training program. This training program ensures volunteers are able to plan and lead safe and enjoyable outdoors adventures, and it’s how the Military Outdoors program will continue to have the greatest impact on the veteran community. Graduates of their Outings Leader Training go on to plan and safely lead many different types of outings in their communities, all of which help veterans and their families get outdoors.
In August 2017, the Military Outdoors program [graduated] 40 new volunteer leaders, many from New York City and the Tri-State area. These new volunteers will go on to lead 1000s of veterans and their families on day hikes in Central Park, kayaking trips on the Hudson, overnight backpacking outings in nearby parks, and more.
Learn how you can get involved by contacting Aaron Leonard at aaron.leonard@sierraclub.org and visit our website www.sierraclub.org/military
www.homelandmagazine.com