Keeping in line with the last week or so it seems and my refusal to sleep, sounds like as good a time as any to share how the first day of staging / last day of America went.
Got to O'hare this morning for my 8:30 flight to Philly after saying final farewells to Mom, Dad, Sarah, and Christine. Had enough time before the flight to bag some Garrett's popcorn for the trip. At the terminal, I ran into two other Peace Corps people, and we stuck together the rest of the trip. Landed in Philly and found out my checked bag wasn't so fortunate - it got on a later flight for some reason. Can't wait to see what luggage problems are to come if I can't even get to Philadelphia with my bags! So we headed to the hotel for registration around 12:30.
At staging, we turned in all of our forms and fun stuff, and then got straight to the icebreakers! It was actually cool, one of those where you have a list of descriptions and have to fill it up with different peoples' signatures. One of them was "Only checked 1 bag," so I think a lot of people were glad to have me sign that one. There were 38 of us there, all education volunteers going to Tanzania. It's a really awesome group. I was a little surprised by the age breakdown - I guess I was expecting more people around my age right out of school, but there were only a couple of those. A lot of people probably in their upper 20's, several around middle-age, and a couple older men who had actually served in the Peace Corps before. It was pretty incredible to get so many varied perspectives and just to listen to where everyone came from and why they were there.
We went through a good deal of orientation activities - talked about expectations of volunteers and what we expect to get out of the next 2 years. Tomorrow will be getting Yellow Fever vaccinations and leaving for a long day of travelling. After we finished today, about half of us went to a Japanese restaurant nearby. We are right in the downtown area of Philly, which is really cool. Then got some monstrously large ice cream cones (at least I did...) and at the ice cream place they were selling the old Bonomo's Turkish Taffy!! I couldn't believe it, but ended up buying one of each flavor. Christine's right, I will have to convince my Tanzanian friends that it is my family business from home haha. Later we went out to a bar near the hotel. In case anyone was wondering, yes it was karaoke night, and some of you might know where I'm going with this... For everyone who gave me the sound advice to just be myself, I can say I held true to that so far by getting a large group of us to sing Stayin' Alive on karaoke, and it was pretty glorious. And my last beer in the States was a Blue Moon, so no complaints there.
After coming back to the hotel, someone else mentioned that she was sad she didn't get to see the Liberty Bell and probably wouldn't have time tomorrow before our flight. I really wanted to see it too, and it was only a few blocks away, so we walked over there around midnight to get a glimpse. Very cool old downtown area, lots of HISTORY! mercy. And when I got back, my bag was finally delivered to the hotel so I get to wear different clothes tomorrow!
And now I'm just still not sleeping for some reason, probably partially attributed to inordinate amount of ice cream I had earlier. We leave tomorrow at 7 for shots, then 10 for Newark Airport - even though I vowed never to return there after spending the night on its floors coming back from London. They split us up into small groups for safe keeping, and I volunteered to be a group leader so I get to hand out everyone's passports at the airport. woo! The flight for Amsterdam doesn't leave til 6:30pm. I think it's about 7 hours, and we have a 2 hour layover, then a 10.5 hour flight to Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. When we finally get there, it will be 9:45pm local time, so I will be extremely thrown off for sure. It should be fun though, I'm sure I will finally catch up on sleep then.
Great first day. Just a brief update on the day's happenings, I will post more as soon as I can once we get to Tanzania!
Monday, June 13, 2011
Monday, June 6, 2011
One Week
One week left before leaving. Crazy how much it can change around from being scared, nervous, sad, excited, etc. But always know it's fine. I gotta say I wouldn't have seen this coming a year ago. No, have to admit, I wasn't one of those that knew their whole life they wanted to join the Peace Corps. which is good. because if i had planned on it, it probably wouldn't have worked out this way. can't plan things really. not even shouldn't, just can't. so it might be worthwhile, hopefully even helpful to someone, to share how i got to this point.
the seed was first planted i suppose last summer, august. i guess sometimes its good to be jealous, it can be a good motivator. hadn't really considered PC before, but after hearing from someone else looking to do it, i was kind of wishing i was too. i didn't know too much about it at that point, but i knew it seemed better than starting a typical job after college. still, thought it was too late to want to try and to that. everyone who does the peace corps plans on doing it for years and has done some awesome international service beforehand to be qualified, right? i studied abroad in europe, but that wouldn't even count for anything, it wasn't a service trip.
went to the career fair and happened to talk to a recruiter from an engineering company who had done the peace corps after ND before he started work. he suggested i go talk to someone from the PC table, so i figured why not. the recruiter i talked to basically erased all the fears i had about being too late or unqualified. he told me about his service in Morocco, and about the different PC volunteer programs and all. I saw one that seemed absolutely perfect. doing water sanitation work, something i was very interested in and a perfect way to use some of my engineering skills for something really meaningful. so i got excited. but its still a long process, he said, so i need to get moving if i really want to do it right after graduating.
did pretty much the entire application that night, and got my recommendation letters and all within a few days. i knew it was a selective process, but i was sure it was what i wanted to do, so it would work out. so i had my interview - the only interview i've actually enjoyed being in - and was nominated for service. i mentioned that i was interested in doing water sanitation, and she thought that was great.
i get a call a couple days later. turns out those programs required fluency in another language, not something i had to offer, so she couldn't nominate me for that. but she saw i had done some tutoring... how about teaching science in Sub-Saharan Africa??
teaching, eh? well, it was the water work that had first really attracted me. i knew i could be effective doing that with my engineering and construction backgrounds. but i had never taught before, would i even be good at that? sure, i'll get an amazing experience out of the peace corps no matter what, but if i can't be effective in what i'm trying to do, then i'm not really helping anyone.
but again i got some unexpected inspiration. gained some pretty random connections to other serving or soon-to-be-leaving teaching volunteers, and i was able to get a lot of info from them. i realized the job title i had as a volunteer wasn't all that important. you might think you can save the world by doing some work in particular, but in the end the real impact you're going to have is from the connections you make with the people you're living with. no matter where you are or what you're doing. and i know i'll be able to do that, and that's what i really want to get out of this.
and so a few shots, blood tests, medical exams, forms, phone interviews, and a good amount of patience later, i got my invitation to go to Tanzania to teach math. and now im just a few more shots, medical exams, forms, and international flights away from being there!
so many people who helped me with this. for those who were my first inspiration, wrote a recommendation letter, gave me good advice, or just encouraged me along the way, you probably know who you are, so thank you. and to anyone who might be interested in serving in the peace corps at some point in the future, i hope i can be of some help to you too.
ive been trying to brush up on some Swahili before i go, but i dont think that's really going to be all that helpful once i'm there. there'll be a time for that. but now probably best to spend time with friends, family, go to sox games, and eat Giordano's pizza. and stay up til 5am writing blogs i guess.
the seed was first planted i suppose last summer, august. i guess sometimes its good to be jealous, it can be a good motivator. hadn't really considered PC before, but after hearing from someone else looking to do it, i was kind of wishing i was too. i didn't know too much about it at that point, but i knew it seemed better than starting a typical job after college. still, thought it was too late to want to try and to that. everyone who does the peace corps plans on doing it for years and has done some awesome international service beforehand to be qualified, right? i studied abroad in europe, but that wouldn't even count for anything, it wasn't a service trip.
went to the career fair and happened to talk to a recruiter from an engineering company who had done the peace corps after ND before he started work. he suggested i go talk to someone from the PC table, so i figured why not. the recruiter i talked to basically erased all the fears i had about being too late or unqualified. he told me about his service in Morocco, and about the different PC volunteer programs and all. I saw one that seemed absolutely perfect. doing water sanitation work, something i was very interested in and a perfect way to use some of my engineering skills for something really meaningful. so i got excited. but its still a long process, he said, so i need to get moving if i really want to do it right after graduating.
did pretty much the entire application that night, and got my recommendation letters and all within a few days. i knew it was a selective process, but i was sure it was what i wanted to do, so it would work out. so i had my interview - the only interview i've actually enjoyed being in - and was nominated for service. i mentioned that i was interested in doing water sanitation, and she thought that was great.
i get a call a couple days later. turns out those programs required fluency in another language, not something i had to offer, so she couldn't nominate me for that. but she saw i had done some tutoring... how about teaching science in Sub-Saharan Africa??
teaching, eh? well, it was the water work that had first really attracted me. i knew i could be effective doing that with my engineering and construction backgrounds. but i had never taught before, would i even be good at that? sure, i'll get an amazing experience out of the peace corps no matter what, but if i can't be effective in what i'm trying to do, then i'm not really helping anyone.
but again i got some unexpected inspiration. gained some pretty random connections to other serving or soon-to-be-leaving teaching volunteers, and i was able to get a lot of info from them. i realized the job title i had as a volunteer wasn't all that important. you might think you can save the world by doing some work in particular, but in the end the real impact you're going to have is from the connections you make with the people you're living with. no matter where you are or what you're doing. and i know i'll be able to do that, and that's what i really want to get out of this.
and so a few shots, blood tests, medical exams, forms, phone interviews, and a good amount of patience later, i got my invitation to go to Tanzania to teach math. and now im just a few more shots, medical exams, forms, and international flights away from being there!
so many people who helped me with this. for those who were my first inspiration, wrote a recommendation letter, gave me good advice, or just encouraged me along the way, you probably know who you are, so thank you. and to anyone who might be interested in serving in the peace corps at some point in the future, i hope i can be of some help to you too.
ive been trying to brush up on some Swahili before i go, but i dont think that's really going to be all that helpful once i'm there. there'll be a time for that. but now probably best to spend time with friends, family, go to sox games, and eat Giordano's pizza. and stay up til 5am writing blogs i guess.
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