Okay, so I'm going to try this blog thing, I can make no promises as to how good I will be at keeping it updated, but I will give it my best effort.
After 1 1/2 years of applications, interviews, medical tests, etc. I am finally leaving for Peace Corps. I'll be serving in Nicaragua for 2 years as a small business development volunteer. Yesterday I flew out of Missouri back to Washington DC for a 3 day staging. I packed up about a day before I left, packing for 2 years abroad, oy vey, not the most fun thing to do. I'm pretty sure I forgot a lot of important things I will need (ex. a raincoat since I'm going there in rainy season) but substituted the space these things would have taken up with random crap (ex. frisbees, harmonica, knitting needles, 80's breakdancing movies, my ipod packed full of reggeaton and meatloaf), but I'm sure they will prove to be useful items for my experience in some way.
All 39 of the Peace Corps Volunteers that will be serving in Nicaragua are meeting here, in DC, and then we will all fly out on Wednesday at 4am to head down to Nicaragua for 3 months of training. I go to our first orientation meeting in about an hour, I'm guessing it will be packed full of paperwork and ice-breaker games (I know sounds amazing, I'm sure it will be), but I'll be excited to meet everyone, it should be an interesting group of people. I'll report back.
OK, so I shall hopefully write again soon and let you know how things are going, i'm sure the posts will become more interesting when I'm thrown into my Nicaraguan village constantly say inappropriate things on accident in Spanish and wind up in all sorts of awkward situations. I'm sure plenty of this will happen so I'll keep you up to date.
