Name: Oza Plynton
Oza is the owner and designer of Nicogati Designs, a jewelry company. She was born and raised in East New York, Brooklyn.

I used to go to Girl Scout meetings at the community center in the Cypress Hills housing projects and that's where I first found out about the Girls’ Vacation Fund.

I was so young, back then. They had the 8 and 9-year-old trips, and it was an amazing experience. I was in the pool all day—they had to force me out. I loved it! Mountain climbing, crafts, the whole nine yards. It was my first experience camping and the only thing difficult was going home. I have no complaints, really. The only thing I didn't like was the corned beef hash, but they don't have that anymore.

It's one of the few things in my life that I can say was pretty much all good memories. My focus was really on arts and crafts and making things like silk-screening. And it made a huge impression on my life—I ended up going to art school.

I grew up with a lot of pressure and I think that camp was an outlet that allowed me to remain a sensitive and loving human being regardless of the circumstances of the environment I lived in. There was a lot of good energy and love there and really good friendships.

I've never worked for anyone; I own my whole company and my whole life I've been a traveler. Going to camp was when I first learned to pack a suitcase. Because of my experiences there, I'm really comfortable going into environments where I don't know the language, I don't know anyone or even know the alphabet.

I think there's a lot of confidence and self-sufficiency I got from that experience, and getting to know myself. Developmentally, it gives you the state of mind and skills to see life as a continuous exploration—I have a lust for it now. It's important in helping girls to see the enjoyment of the adventure—to embody empowerment instead of fear. And since you look at life differently, you live it differently.

The first year I went, we went on a mountain climbing trip to Mt. Zore. We were walking up, and up, and up, and I was like, "Good Lord!"—you know how kids are.

But when we got to the top—when we got to the high peak—and I sat there with my legs dangling down and I looked around, it was all worthwhile. That's now how I live my life. No matter what the struggle is to get to the top, when you get there, the view always makes it worth it. That became a real motivational kind of thing for me.

The socialization process—to be encountering people from all over the place, both campers and counselors—is also a very good thing for kids to get used to at a young age. Traveling and meeting people from different environments and socioeconomic backgrounds is important and invaluable.

It's interesting. Parents and children seem to have a really hard time letting go these days and you have a lot of semi-functioning adults out there as a result of that. You really need to let them go. All of the facilities are there from Girls Quest to help them gain a level of functioning and confidence by developing their own problem-solving and critical thinking skills.

They'll also be doing that in an environment where they learn how to relate to the earth. Kids now don't know how to function without a Gameboy. Camping was incredibly important to our spiritual development and self-sufficiency, not in a desperate Y2K way, but in a "Hey - I know how to deal with this," way. To this day once a year I like to go camping because it helps me put it all into perspective.

I hate to be corny, but the whole experience made me a better person.