For the 50th Anniversary of the Peace Corps, Antigua's volunteers have been writing articles for the local paper talking about our experiences thus far being Peace Corps volunteers in the Eastern Caribbean: Here are the stories that have come out so far

Ryan Jones: http://www.antiguaobserver.com/?p=57199

Me: http://www.antiguaobserver.com/?p=60625

Jen Davis: Came out on 8/19 and isn't showing up online yet.

I just got home not too long ago after what felt like a very long day. Fridays always feel like long days but this one felt extra long. Maybe it was cleaning out the office and clearing many years of rubbish from hidden cupboards, maybe it was the multitude of power outages throughout the day, maybe it was the heat, maybe it was the super-packed bus ride home that felt endless, but whatever the cause, it was a long.

By the time I got home, all I could think was “shower, shower, shower”. So I slammed my door, ran to the bathroom, jumped into the shower and stayed there for about 20 minutes. (Who knew I’d ever want to take a 20 minute cold shower, right?). So I get out of the shower, walk over to my room, go to lay my clothes on the bed and I see a tail. I freeze and I start thinking to myself, “is that a mouse tail or a lizard tail”. The tail wiggles a little bit and I decide, I’ve gotta move my sheets and figure this out. So I take a deep breath, muster up some courage, move the sheet and to my great relief a lizard takes a flying leap off of my bed and onto the floor.

After a year in Antigua, I still don’t expect to find things wriggling around my bed but I was genuinely relieved to find that it was just a lizard. And then I was pretty proud of myself for brushing the thing off the sheets and resuming my normal routine. However, if I had found a mouse in my sheets, well that would have been a completely different story.

For the past few weeks I’ve had a pretty bad mouse problem, in two days I caught four mice and I know there are more lurking around just waiting to be caught. I’ve developed a routine if I have to get out of bed in the middle of the night. I peek out of my mosquito net, grab my phone and use it as a flashlight to sweep the floor to make sure there are no critters under my feet. Then I put on a pair of slippers, and shuffle to the spare bedroom where I turn on the light and scan the floor. Once I’ve decided the spare bedroom is clear, I shuffle to the bathroom, turn on that light, and take several steps back as I wait for the critters to crawl back into their corners. I do this EVERY time I have to use the bathroom after dark, because on more than one occasion I’ve found a huge roach, a mouse, a giant frog, or some other critter lurking and waiting to surprise the heck out of me.

As I reflect back on a year of service in Antigua, obviously more than critters come to mind, but I do wonder if I’ll ever get completely over the shock of seeing something whiz past me in the middle of the night. The grey blur of a house mouse, the creepy shuffle of a cock roach, or the alien type saunter of a centipede. Will I ever get over that? Probably not.

So in other news, I haven’t updated my blog since April. I make no promises about trying to be better about blogging, I’m clearly rubbish at it. But I do have a pretty good excuse; I got sooooo busy with Camp GROW I really let go of my personal life altogether in exchange for loads and loads of work on camp. Which, by the way, was a HUGE success and there will definitely be another camp in 2012.

If you want to see pictures from camp, check out www.facebook.com/gardcenter or if you want to see our video you can see it here:

As much as I sometimes miss living in a big city with lots of choices for groceries, restaurants, entertainment, etc., there’s something really nice about living in a small place and meeting my neighbors. I get support from my neighbors in all sorts of ways…

· They tell me if I’ve missed someone stopping by my house when I wasn’t home.· They offer to help me get my coconuts out of my tree.· They bring me fruit from their trees. Mmmmhhhh guavas.· They look after Hugo when he gets out of the yard. · They offer words of encouragement when I’m struggling to get myself and my bike up the hill. Shouting things like, “Lookin’ good!” and “Stayin’ fit!”· They offer lifts to the bus stop or to work on days that I’m not riding my bike.· They offer friendly smiles and kind words. I especially love it when I’m getting off the bus from town and one of my students yells from a quarter of a mile down the road “HI MISS HALL!!!!!!!!!!!!” or “HI TEACHER!!!!!!!!!”· When I’m running with Hugo they give me nods of encouragement, extra friendly good mornings, and similarly to when I’m on my bike… “Stayin’ fit!” and “Lookin’ good”· They tell me when local cricket games are and how the village’s team is doing… we’re winning by the way, Seatons just won a championship game last week, GO SEATONS!!!!

My neighbors in Seattle have always been courteous but they’re just not as willing to break out of their comfort zones as people are in my village here. If one of my neighbors at home told me, “Where’s your bike? You gotta keep riding to stay fit” I would have thought they had lost their minds. But meanwhile, the 70 year old gentleman who lives down the street will always tell me to “keep it moving on that bike”.

When I finished my run this morning, as I do after all my runs, I opened up my front door (and left it open), rolled out my yoga mat, turned on the fan and sat down in front of it, and started doing crunches and stretches while singing along to my iPod. One of my neighbors rolled by on his bike, stopped in front of my house to make sure he got my attention (it’s hard to do when I’m jamming to the Submarines) and then shouted, “lookin’ good, keep it up!” Is there anything that can make a person feel better when they’re all hot and sweaty and pushing through crunches then to have someone tell them that they’re doing a good job? I’d argue that there’s not.

So long story short, I love my neighbors and love the encouragement that they give me. I hope when I go home I can develop a similar relationship with my neighbors there… bring a little bit of the Caribbean back to the States.

Speaking of fresh coconuts, check out this beautiful coconut from the GARD Center. =) It filled up that entire glass and was delicious!

I received some VERY exciting news today and of course I had to share it with all of you, my Peace Corps Partnership projects are now appearing on the Peace Corps Partnership website! HOOORAH! This means that people can now make online donations to my projects. What projects you ask?

In February I sent out an email which mentioned two projects that I am working on here in Antigua. The first is Camp GROW (Gaining Respect for the Outdoors and the World) which is a joint project between my organization the Gilbert Agricultural and Rural Development Center (GARD Center) and the Environmental Awareness Group (EAG). The second project is a library project for Pares Primary School.

Serving in the Peace Corps has been such a remarkable experience for me in so many ways and these projects represent a small fraction of the work that the Peace Corps and our local community counterparts are trying to accomplish in Antigua. Namely, promoting literacy and providing safe places for young people to learn and play.

In order to get these projects off the ground, I need your help. If you can donate to either project, that is FANTASTIC! If you’re not able to donate but you are willing to spread the word to your friends and family members about these projects, that’s GREAT too! Also, if you work for a company that matches employee’s charitable donations, please keep that in mind when making your donation. We don’t want to miss out on those matches, do we? =)

To learn more about Camp GROW or to make a donation, please visit: https://www.peacecorps.gov/index.cfm?shell=donate.contribute.projDetail&projdesc=538-008

To learn more about the Pares Primary School Library project or to make a donation, please visit: https://www.peacecorps.gov/index.cfm?shell=donate.contribute.projDetail&projdesc=538-007

Yesterday, my friend Gwynn (Peace Corps Suriname) shared a video about Peace Corps on Facebook called, “Poop in a Hole”. The video is hilarious and touches on a lot of stuff that MOST Peace Corps volunteers face. But the thing about serving as a Peace Corps volunteer in Antigua is that it’s not like most Peace Corps posts, life here isn’t as hard as life in more remote areas… I don’t poop in a hole.

Having life be easier can be good and it can be bad. It’s good because sometimes I feel like I’m able to get a lot more done. The fact that I spend my day working on a computer in an air conditioned office, designing marketing campaigns for upcoming courses, teaching computer classes, writing grants for summer camps, etc., in some ways it feels like what I might be doing at a non-profit at home. And that’s good right? Because it gives me skills that I’ll be able to use at home, yes?

But at the same time, the ease can be frustrating. Most of us didn’t sign up for the Peace Corps thinking that it was going to be so similar to home. We wanted it to be different; we wanted to know (as much as we could) what it felt like to live at the level that most of the world has to live on. Difficulties getting water, no indoor plumbing, experiencing life in a small remote village where things feel like they’re moving at a slower pace and people spend more time with one another. We wanted all of those things.

It’s hard to explain why having things be similar to home is hard. I guess it’s that you see a lot the stuff that reminds you of home but your friends and family aren’t there to share it with and you don’t have the same resources (e.g. income) to enjoy all of those luxuries of home. My life sometimes feels like I’m living in Seattle but I’m broke and I have to do 80% of my shopping at 7/11 and the dollar store… oh and it’s like 85 degrees all the time and I have to walk everywhere. =)

Don’t get me wrong, I’m enjoying my Peace Corps experience but I guess it’s not what I expected. And I suppose that’s the reality of life, things never live up to our expectations. If the point was to go someplace new, learn some things and share some of my skills with new people then I can say that I am accomplishing that goal. But if the goal was to go and poop in a hole for two years then I have most definitely failed.

First the video:

And now a list of the things that I have and haven’t experienced that the video mentions…

Here’s a list (from the video) of stuff that I haven’t had to deal with:

• Thank GOD no diarrhea yet.

• No fevers (yet)

• Learn a new language – people do speak dialect in Antigua but if I try to speak dialect I sound like a moron.

• Pooping in a hole

• Dreaming about ice cream and soda – we have all of that here in surplus. I do dream about Thai and Indian food though. Mmmmmm Pad See Ew.

• So far have had Turkey at Thanksgiving

• No parasites (yet) – but I should probably have this rash on my arm checked out.

• So far I haven’t run into anyone wanting a bribe.

• No government coups

• My counterpart would NEVER steal money, everyone in my office is sooooooo honest it’s awesome.

Here’s a list of what I have had to deal with:

• Waiting 16 months to know whether I made it into the Peace Corps

• Getting stared at as I walk down the street. Not because I’m foreign though, mostly guys just hiss, whistle, and try to get my attention. That is very new and weird to me.

• Not feeling like I fit in. This isn’t so much at work, it’s everywhere else. Although when I was teaching classes I had a hard time relating to the kids and they definitely had a hard time relating to me. I’m only a few years older than most of them but our lives and experiences have been quite different.

• Trying new foods. Lots and lots of new foods at first but now that I live on my own I pretty much stick to cooking what I know.

• Weird rashes… I really should go get these looked at.

• Keeping a diary (or blog) but being bad at both of them and then thinking I will probably just stop trying.

• Being a long way from home.

• Looking like a homeless person – old ratty clothes that have stains on them, sweating all day as you walk around town because you can’t drive, all the while carrying a MASSIVE backpack that is dirty and has holes in it. Oh and never wearing any makeup because as soon as you put it on it slides off.

• Feeling under qualified to “save the world”… or just do my job… which is sometimes well defined until it’s not anymore.

• Being too hot, being too hot, being too hot, being too hot (I’ve never felt too cold).

• No AC at home but I do have AC in the office which most Peace Corps volunteers don’t get.

• Trying to Skype/Video chat with people at home but can’t make it through (can’t hear anything) because of a bad connection.

• Facebook friends looking at pics and say “you’re livin’”.

• Plenty bucket showers when my water goes out, just happened again last week. When it’s not a bucket shower it’s a cold water shower. Also, can’t take a bucket shower using the water in my cistern because it’s filled with what I think are mosquito larvae. They could be something else but I can’t think of what. Thousands of little black worm looking things that swim. I dumped a bucket of bleach in the tank and they lived through it. Must be mosquitos, right? I only use that water to flush my toilet when the water is out.

• Feeling like, “I just came here to help” and then running into PLENTY of people who don’t want your help. (Thankfully none of them are at my primary worksite)

• Making a very LITTLE bit of money, but unlike on the video, over here it’s not a lot and nobody wants to marry me for it.

• Can’t drive a car (oh how I miss my car), gotta take the bus (oh how I hate the bus). Sometimes I ride in the back of trucks but not very often.

• Waiting for what feels like a long time between care packages but really isn’t. My family and friends are awesome! Although, I have had two care packages go “missing”… somehow they got “lost” between the US postal service and the Antiguan postal service.

• Reading a lot of books and watching a lot of movies.

• Marking the calendar and figuring out how long I’ve been here vs. how long it will be before I get to go back home.

I have to be up at 4:30 in the morning tomorrow to make sure that I can get to training on-time and I’m slightly irritated by that. I have to be on the bus by 5:45, to get to town by 6:30, so I can walk a mile to the west bus station, and get in line for the Coolidge bus that leaves at 7:00 so I can try to make it to the conference facility by 8:30. It’s a lot of bus time.

Also, all I can think about tonight (besides having to get up at 4:30am) is that my house is a total mess. My floors need to be mopped. My new books need to be sorted. I have kitchen towels soaking in bleach water in the bathroom that need to be scrubbed and hung to dry. I want to read my new graphic design and photography books… oh and I want to start my new novel… oh and I need to work on logos that I owe to a few of my community members… and that Excel spreadsheet I owe a neighbor… and I need to catch up with the kids that I’m tutoring because I’ve been so darn busy these last 3 weeks we’ve missed 3 sessions. Also need to chat with my mom because we’ve not spoken for weeks… and send a few emails to friends who might just think that I’ve fallen of the face of the planet because I’ve waited so long to send emails.

Needless to say the list goes on, and on, and on and it’s easier to blog about it than it is to actually finish the work. Where’s all that free-time that I’m supposed to have in the Peace Corps again? I could really use some of that right about now. I am committing myself to being productive this weekend. I am not sure how I will do it but it must be done because this is getting to be ridiculous. It’s time to start ticking stuff off that list and refusing to add more items to the list until I’ve finished what I’ve started. :D

I know, I know, I’m the worst blogger ever! Blogs are really hard to keep up on for me so I think I’m going to try something different. Starting later this month, I’m going to do a photo blog. One picture a week (maybe more and maybe less) of something that’s going on in my life here in Antigua. I would have done this sooner but my darn camera broke the very first week I was in St. Lucia and I haven’t had a good camera to take photos with for months. My replacement camera is coming with Jamie and Gene who will be visiting next week.

Speaking of friends visiting, I am SUPER excited for Jamie and Gene to come to Antigua. Plans are in the works for plenty beach time, a cruise around the island, snorkeling, consumption of many local foods, a beach lime with my host family (DJ and all), and lots and lots of other great stuff. We’re going to have a blast and it will be so nice to have a few vacation days.

Now for story time…

Work of late has been fantastically stressful. We have a ton of projects that we’re working on and at the beginning of January classes started which means we now have 60 new students wandering our halls. It’s hard to explain what the addition of 60 extra people in our VERY small office does to our work environment. It’s loud, it’s chaotic, questions fly in every direction, people are being pulled in and out of classrooms, offices, etc. Not a moment passes without a phone ringing, a student walking into the office, or one of us losing something in the mess that is our desks. It kind of reminds me of the images you see of the floor of the New York stock exchange. Crazy freakin’ busy! The tension at the center is palpable and at least in the short term there’s not a whole heck of a lot we can do about it. Our facilities aren’t going to magically expand. Nobody wants the classes to get smaller; in fact we’d love it if we had room for more students. It’s just going to be stressful for well, the next 8 months.

For the most part everyone has been staying pretty positive about the chaos but the entire office is a bit on edge. I find that as the day comes to a close my head feels heavy and I can think of nothing but crawling into bed and watching movies on my laptop… even reading feels like too much effort. So today, in an effort to arrive in my bed all the faster, I decided I would take a “shortcut” home.

My home is about 2.5 miles from my office and if I take the main road, it’s a relatively easy trek. While I’m walking through my village I feel comfortable enough but walking on the main road is kind of scary. People drive incredibly fast and they don’t really look for pedestrians because pedestrians aren’t ever on the road… so I’m always on high alert if I’m walking or riding my bike. If I could find a way to get off the road AND get home faster, well then that would be GREAT.

Last week while I was walking I noticed that there was a herd of goats which were cutting through some fields and it looked like the fields might lead to Seatons. So I figured if the goats could find their way to Seatons (I recognized some of the goats from my village or at least I thought I recognized them) I could easily find my way too… after all, I’m smarter than a goat right? So after going about halfway home on the main road, I turned off and went stomping through the bush.

The first trail I went down led me about a quarter of a mile away from the road but I eventually reached a dead end. DARN, I’d have to backtrack to the main road. On the second trail I noticed a woman who was carrying a bucket of tomatoes on her head, some seed trays in one hand and a bag of tomatoes in another hand. She looked very much like she knew where she was going so I thought I must be on the right trail. Yes, not only goats can find their way through the bush apparently we humans can too. After asking her if the trail led to Seatons, she smiled and looked me up and down and said, “yes, but you might not make it in those shoes.”

I looked down at my feet and saw my good ol’ Tevas. Ugly as sin but great for walking long distances and especially great for hiking a silly little goat trail. So I told her that I thought I’d be fine and if she wouldn’t mind showing me the way I’d help her carry her tomatoes. She looked at me again and I saw that she was eyeing me up and down and seemed to be focused on my work attire, a black skirt with a tank top and a purple sweater. She kind of gestured to her own clothes, she’d clearly been working on the farm all day, and then she specifically pointed to her boots and said “see my shoes will protect me from the bush”. Not to be deterred, I told her that I’m sure I can make it, grabbed her bag of tomatoes and started following her.

As we walked along the trail, I couldn’t help but smile. First of all, she was right of course. The trail had really tall grass, large bushes with thick thorns on them, and random holes that were accidents waiting to happen. But besides the tricky terrain, the view was gorgeous. Golden brown fields all around me, giant sugar mills on either side, the ocean in the distance, goats and cattle grazing on the grass; the whole scene was picturesque, I felt like I was walking through the scene of a movie. And all along the trail, I got to chat with my neighbor who I found out was named Grace and owns the fields across the road. She was telling me about how she loves farming, how she used to raise goats but can’t any longer because someone stole them (how anyone could steal anything from such a nice lady I have no idea!), and how she thinks she should learn to drive standard transmission so she wouldn’t have to walk to her fields every day.

I for one am thrilled that Grace walks to her fields every day because if she didn’t I might not have ever met her. When I left her and her tomatoes at the gate of her house, she told me that I should walk with her again someday. I really hope that I get to walk with her because I haven’t had such a pleasant walk in a long time. In some ways it was a perfect Peace Corps moment, to meet a neighbor and chat while walking home. In another way, it reminds me very much that I can have that moment anywhere in the world so long as I am open to the experience. These are things that I hope to remember when I head home. It’s important to get outside and walk in your neighborhood, meet the people who inhabit the same space as you, hear their stories and find out why they love what they’re doing. There’s just no reason for us to be so isolated when we share the world with so many other lovely people.

So I realized that I haven’t actually put much of anything on my blog about my job here in Antigua, so I’m going to fix that now. =)

I’m working at the Gilbert Agricultural and Rural Development Center (GARD Center) helping them with various branding, communications, and IT projects. Over the past few weeks, I created a new website for them at http://gardc.org/, designed a series of pamphlets entitled the “Cost of Production Series”, created posters and flyers to advertise for their upcoming courses, created a course catalog, helped to design/layout the annual report, created a slide presentation (80+ slides long) which tells the history of the GARD Center over the past twenty years and a few other things as well.

I guess the strangest thing about my job at GARD Center is that it’s basically a desk job. I left Seattle thinking I was leaving my desk job behind me and got to Antigua only to pick up another desk job. At first this kind of bothered me, but then I realized that I came to Antigua to share some of my skills with GARD Center and if these are the skills they need then it’s a good thing I have them to share. The question is; if I weren’t working on these projects, what would I be working on? The answer: I sincerely have no idea.

What’s even better about the projects that I’ve been working on these past few weeks is that they’ve made me realize that I really like doing this kind of layout and design work. I get really focused when I work on these materials and can spend hours dinking around with them to make them just as I want them to be. The problem is that I know that I’m probably breaking 1001 design rules so I’m strongly considering taking some design courses when I get back to the States.

Overall, I love the work that I’m doing with GARD Center. The group of women that I work with are amazingly talented, fun to be around, and very committed to their work and the Center’s students. I’m learning so much more at GARD Center than I feel like I’m giving but I suppose that’s all part of the experience of being a Peace Corps volunteer... your relationship with your organization is give and take and you always walk away feeling like you didn’t give as much as you received.

So if you want to view some of the things that I’ve been working on visit http://gardc.org/ and look at the “Resources” page under “GARD Center Publications”. You can also look under “Students” and “Upcoming Courses” to view the course catalog that I created. Below is one of the posters that I created for our upcoming courses.

Thanksgiving in Antigua is bound to be different from Thanksgiving at home. The most obvious difference of course being that Antigua doesn’t celebrate Thanksgiving, so for Antiguans the fourth Thursday in November is just another Thursday. But for me, being an American living abroad, Thanksgiving has suddenly become more important this year than ever before. I’m not exactly sure why this is but I have a few ideas.

First, I feel like I have a lot to be thankful for this year. Joining the Peace Corps was a dream that I had for a long time and to finally be able to do it is an amazing feeling. Granted, this Antiguan Peace Corps experience is not exactly what I imagined my Peace Corps experience would be… I’m not living in a hut in the middle of the bush with no access to electricity or running water. But I’m still doing much of what I set out to do which was simply to live abroad, learn from people whose culture and background were different from my own, and lend my skills and talents to people who might find them helpful. And at the same time as I’m fulfilling the goals that I had for my work as a Peace Corps volunteer, I’m also having a fantastic time outside of work. Where else in the world can you put in a hard week’s work and then spend your weekends snorkeling, relaxing on the beach, sailing, hiking, or just limin’ in town? Yes, I definitely have a lot to be thankful for this year!

Secondly, Thanksgiving feels really important this year because in spite of the great time that I’m having at work and at play, I miss my family, friends, cool fall/winter weather, and American traditions. Since going home isn’t an option, the second best option is to bring as much of a traditional American Thanksgiving here to Antigua. The other volunteers and I have set off to do a big Thanksgiving dinner on Saturday and man ‘o man is it going to be delicious! We’ve invited some of our local friends to join in on the festivities, bought two turkeys and all the fixin’s earlier this week, and I’m hauling out all of the Christmas movies that I brought so we can have those and Christmas songs playing in the background as we spend the day cooking. So even though it’ll probably be 80 degrees outside, inside will surely feel, smell and sound like a traditional American Thanksgiving.

So if our big Thanksgiving is happening on Saturday, what will I be doing today (on the actual Turkey day)? Well I woke up early this morning, not to watch the Macy’s day parade but rather to do some laundry. I turned on the Christmas carols, filled up my buckets and began scrubbing away. It was my first time using my new rapid washer and I’m IN LOVE with it! It agitates your clothes like a washing machine would and you can actually see the dirt and grime coming lose from them. Between the rapid washer and my wash board, I’m in hand washing heaven. My clothes feel super clean and my knuckles aren’t raw from rubbing the clothes together like a mad woman. After I finished washing my clothes, I filled up my mop bucket and mopped my floors while I sang Christmas carols and took in the nice northerly breeze that’s blowing through my house and signaling that it’s winter in Antigua. Later this afternoon I’ll head into town to meet up with some of the other volunteers and then tonight we’ll all be going to the Air Force base for a big Thanksgiving dinner that we were invited to. That in and of itself will be a new experience as I’ve never spent any time at all on a military base and I’ve especially never had a holiday meal with a bunch of air force personnel. =)

So this Thanksgiving will be much different from previous Thanksgivings. I’m in a new place, celebrating with new friends, and making a lot of new traditions. But I feel so blessed to have the chance to be here and I can honestly say I wouldn’t change it for the world.

For all of my family and friends back home and around the world, I’m thinking of you and miss you lots but I’m sure we’ll see each other soon (you’re coming to visit me right?)!!!! And for my mom, whose birthday falls on Thanksgiving once every seven years, HAPPY THANKSGIVNG AND HAPPY BIRTHDAY, I LOVE YOU SO MUCH and I wish that I could be with you today especially… feeling extra thankful for such an amazing mom today.

Prior to joining the Peace Corps, everyone told me that one of the hardest things about being a Peace Corps volunteer was dealing with all of the down-time that you have. They said that it’s all of those extra hours when you’re not working and haven’t much to do, when reading just isn’t an option anymore because you’ve read too much, it’s those surplus hours that make you go stir-crazy. Now that I’m a Peace Corps volunteer, I’m trying to figure out where all of my down-time is hiding? I want to find those hours upon hours where there’s nothing to do and no place to go. What happened to them? When do I get to spend an entire day in my house curled up on my bed with a good book and a bowl of popcorn? =)

As a Peace Corps volunteer I don’t find that I have all these hours to sit around and contemplate boredom. I work regular work hours five days a week and rarely (and by rarely I mean never) have time at work to just sit around and be bored. By the time I get home in the evening there’s always something to be done… tutoring the neighborhood kids, spending time with local friends and Peace Corps volunteers, cooking food for the next day/week, doing chores around the house. My life here in many ways is like my life at home, filled with work and things to do.

I think this business of keeping busy all of the time is good but it’s also affecting my blogging. There’s too much to do and not very much time to sit down and write about all that I’m doing. Also, the more time I spend in Antigua, the more ordinary my life feels and the less I feel I have to write about. Requests have been made however that I become a more frequent blogger so I will make an effort to do that. Maybe I’ll set a goal to write every other week? That should be manageable I think. =)

I know that it’s been a while since I last wrote but to be honest, not much happened during training besides training. Our days during training felt long, I was up by 6:30, out the door by 7:15, on the bus by 7:45, in training at 8:30 and then off to catch the bus back to Seatons between 4:30 and 6:30 pm every day. The best part of training for me was that every day I’d get to see the other trainees. Prior to leaving for the Peace Corps I’m not sure I would have thought that was a good thing, but now that I’m here I realize how nice it is to have other people experiencing the same thing as you at the same time.

Joining the Peace Corps is just kind of weird. You go from being an independent and fully functioning adult to a quasi-adolescent who is bumbling their way through their daily activities. It’s hard to explain what this feels like except to other people who have experience the same thing. HOWEVER, the good news is that all 7 of us trainees made it through this terribly awkward training phase and as of Friday, October 15th, we’ve become full-fledged Peace Corps volunteers. WAHOOO!

Our swearing in ceremony took place at the Trade Winds hotel which is this fantastically gorgeous hotel on the north side of the island. My awesome host mom bought me a lovely white dress to wear for the occasion and she and my host-brother Aren came to watch the ceremony. In more ways than one, the entire thing felt like a graduation. I suppose it was a type of graduation from training but as I sat there listening to our speakers I couldn’t help but feel like I’ve been doing a lot of these kinds of formal ceremonies lately. =)

Here’s the link to the video that we did for swearing in: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=apdjCHmNR4o

So our swearing in ceremony took place on Friday and then we spent the weekend packing up and moving to our own homes where we will be living for the next two years. My host family helped me move on Sunday and I must say that I was incredibly sad. Seriously, I think if I had it my way I would have stay where I was for several more weeks. My host family is amazing, absolutely amazing and living on my own, well it’s kind of uncomfortable.

It might seem hard to imagine that someone who has spent the past 10 years living on their own and loving every minute of it would find it difficult to live on their own again after just an 8 week reprieve – but it truly is challenging. On Sunday when I came into my house, it had been closed up so the place was sweltering. My first objective (after opening all of the windows) was to hang up my mosquito net since the house is currently without screens. Luckily my host family helped me with that and after some incredibly awkward maneuvering we were able to get it up. It is a bit lopsided and precarious in some areas but it’ll do. In all honesty I think we did the best we could with the materials that we had available, the Peace Corps issued net seems to be made for a bed that’s really short in a bedroom that has an incredibly low ceiling. We ended up using fishing wire to suspend it from the ceiling, it looks wonky but I feel much safer under it so I don’t care.

After we got my net up my host family left and I was left to pull together my new house. Problem number one? The water was off that day! This has been a regular occurrence since my arrival in Antigua. The water seems to go off 2 – 3 times a week, sometimes for a few hours and other times for a day. This time when the water went off it didn’t come back on for about 36 hours. So imagine if you will my moving in day. It’s sweltering hot in my house and I’ve just spent the entire afternoon packing, sweating, and moving. What’s the first thing I want? That’s right, I want a shower! But I can’t have a shower because there’s no water. What else do I want? I want to mop my floors, scrub the counters, clean the house and make it more habitable. Again, not possible because there’s no running water. Luckily however, there is a rain cistern outside and I could get water from there to wash a plate or two, flush the toilet (yes you need water for that don’t you?) and at the end of the day, take a bucket bath. None of this is horrible; I don’t want anyone reading this to think that I think my life is horrible because I had to spend a little over a day without running water. What it was though was incredibly inconvenient and moderately frustrating.

On day three of living in my house I’m beginning to feel slightly more comfortable. My favorite part of my house is my front porch which overlooks the ocean and the back of my house which overlooks the rolling hills of Seatons, Glanvilles and Willikies. My least favorite part of my house is my bathroom because in order to get to the shower you have to jump over the toilet (it’s that small). But this morning I woke up early, showered, prepared a bowl of cereal (was going to make oatmeal but the propane was out), grabbed my book and sat outside on my front porch and read during breakfast. That my friends seemed to make everything else a little better. It made up for the night before when my electricity went out and I had to use my phone to find my way to the bathroom where I was scared half to death by a Cuban tree frog that was sitting there waiting for me to make a move. The move I decided to take was to delay going to the bathroom until morning and wait for the frog to leave. It turns out it was a good move, the frog was nowhere to be seen by the time I went to the bathroom this morning. To be honest though, I have no idea where it went considering all the doors and windows were closed.

One last story before I wrap up this novel of a blog post. Tonight when Aren and Quamaine were leaving (host brother and a boy that I’m tutoring) the neighbor’s kitten was on my porch. I’ve been noticing this kitten since I moved in on Sunday. It’s an adorable little white and orange kitten that’s maybe 8 weeks old. To me she seems too small to be on her own but the animals here are not like the pampered animals in the States, they seem to roam free on their own a lot sooner. Anyway, when the boys left I pet the kitten for a second and then went to go back into the house but she followed me inside. I decided that the kitty looked hungry so I dished her out the only dairy product I could find in my fridge, cottage cheese, put it on a saucer and watched to see if she’d eat it. To my surprise she did eat it and rather than waiting to see if she finished, I decided I was going to close the door and get ready for bed.

Well I was in the bathroom brushing my teeth and I thought I heard the kitten crying. I was worried that she might be fighting with another animal over the food I’d given her so I opened up the door and rather than seeing another animal I just saw this flash and the kitten ran inside my house. For those of you who know me, my first reaction was to shut the door and keep the kitten. It is after all incredibly cute, very young, and apparently in love with me. It took all of my willpower to stop the kitty from nuzzling my ankles, pick her up and put her back on the porch. But I did it! Sadly right after I put her on the porch she jumped straight back into the house. It took me doing this four times before the kitten finally stayed put.

All I have to say is that if I had had a kitty litter box in my house, my neighbor wouldn’t have gotten her kitten back. It would be my own little kitten and I would name her something ridiculously cute and let her snuggle with me at night in my bed. As it stands though, I’m still allergic to cats and I didn’t have a kitty litter box so I put her outside and tried not to feel heartless about the ordeal.

Well that was incredibly long. I’ll try not to wait so long to write these so they’ll be shorter.

I seriously have the best host family a girl could ever ask for. I don’t know how to explain how awesome they are without using words like, “super cool”, “rad”, “chill”, and “freakin’ amazing”! Anything can happen when you tell a bunch of strangers that they have to live together for 6 weeks, and I’ve heard some horror stories from volunteers who have served around the world, but my host family experience has been nothing but good times and a lot of laughs.

Today my host family hosted a picnic at the beach for all of the Peace Corps volunteers currently in Antigua. Sadly, not all of the volunteers could make it but for those of us who did, I’m certain that we will never forget it. Altogether I’d guess there were about 25 people there today, mostly relatives of my host family and close friends plus 3 other volunteers. There was so much local food it was crazy. Algen started cooking at 5am this morning and made ducana with chop-up, goat water, pepper pot, freshly baked bread, roasted chicken, roasted ham, coleslaw, mashed pumpkin, spiced rice and a whole host of other foods. He’s a really great cook and it takes talent to cook for so many people. We took all these foods to the beach, setup two pop-up tents, chairs, and folding tables and then the fun began.

Norma-Jean, Jen and I took the kids to the water to swim while some of the adults hung-out at the tent. We went to Long Bay which is this gorgeous beach on the east coast of Antigua where the sand is blindingly white and the water is clear and glassy like bathwater. I gave the kids my snorkel and mask and they took turns looking in the water for fish, which was quite hilarious to watch because the mask was much too large for their face. I think we must have been out there for a few hours before going back to the tent to grab some food. When we got back to the tent, there was a DJ finishing setting up his equipment. Yep, a full-on DJ with a generator, massive speakers and a grip of other electronics who spun soca, dance and reggae music. The music and the dancing started and the whole beach joined in, it was fantastic! There were tourists coming down from the resort and peaking around the corner to where the music was, and other locals who decided to dance with us. What a freakin’ party we started.

After lunch, when we were all starting to get too hot from the sun, some clouds rolled in and decided to dump rain on us to cool us off. Once it started raining, everyone ran for the water and jumped in! The music was blaring, there was thunder and a little lightening, and we all danced in the rain and swam in the ocean. The rain lasted just long enough to cool us off but once everyone was in the ocean they stayed there. I couldn’t help but sit and laugh at how awesome my life is right now. I honestly can’t believe I get to live here and hang out with all of these cool people for two whole years. YAY!

We wrapped up all of the tents, food, and equipment just before it got dark and headed home. I’m exhausted right now but it’s best to write these things down when they’re fresh. Today was a day for the record books!

At some point I need to write about my school attachment at Pares Primary School (might just be the cutest kids in Antigua at that school) and my work site at GARD. Both of those are moving pretty slowly right now since I’m only at each once a week and spend the other three days a week in training. But work should be mentioned lest everyone think that all I’m doing is going to training Monday – Friday and partying with my host family on the weekends. =) So more on that later… for now, I’m exhausted and sun burned so I’m going to bed.

I can count on my hands how many times I’ve taken the bus in the States. It’s not that I don’t like the bus; it’s that busses back home were never a convenient option for me. However, here in Antigua, since Peace Corps volunteers are not allowed to drive, the bus is our only option. And let me let you in on a little secret… the bus still is not a convenient option for me. Regardless, it’s my only mode of transportation so I take my seat on the bus and curse myself for all the years I took my car for granted.

Busses here in Antigua are not like busses in the states. Here’s a picture of one that I found online:

The busses fit about 15 – 25 people (depending on its size) and I’ve only been on a bus once that had empty seats. I wish I were brave enough to take a picture of what the inside of an Antiguan bus looks like when it’s full but I’m not… and plus I think it might be more than a little rude to take pictures of strangers who are just trying to get to where they’re going without some crazy American snapping a picture of them. Anyway, Antigua is hot (right now it’s very hot) and usually busses don’t have air conditioning so riding the bus is a hot, sweaty and mildly claustrophobic activity.

Yesterday I was on an older bus that was quite large and I was sitting in one of the center aisle seats. When I say “aisle seat” I don’t mean the seat next to the aisle, I mean the seat directly in the aisle. It’s hard to explain but there are seats that fold down into the aisle to create a seat where none would normally be. Since the bus I was on was an older bus, the shocks seemed to be going out which made my bus ride an especially bouncy one. Suddenly I got this image of the “Knight Bus” from the third Harry Potter movie, “The Prisoner of Azkaban”. When Harry gets on the bus and is tossed around while the driver who appears to be blind is hurling his way down the streets of London. Now I wouldn’t say my driver was blind, but I would say that “hurling down the street” would be the right phrasing for his driving. He flew around corners, up hills, over pot holes and gravel, all the while I felt like I was holding on for dear life as I sweated through my clothes and tried not to be nauseous.

Not all bus rides are like that, some – even though they’re terribly crowded and hot – can be downright relaxing. But I will say that I was ever-so-happy to get off that bus and have my feet on solid ground.

Ok I’m forcing myself to write a blog entry while a lot of this stuff is fresh on my mind, I’m super tired because I’ve been up since 4 am so if this winds up being changed in a few days when I realize that none of it makes sense… then so be it.

Peace Corps is nothing if not a lesson in PATIENCE and FLEXIBILITY! So when 17 of us Peace Corps Trainees (PCTs) found ourselves waylaid in St. Lucia for an extra 4 days because of Hurricane Earl and Tropical Storm Fiona, we had a nice amount of time to contemplate how patient and flexible we really are. In general we were able to keep a good sense of humor about the whole thing but we all were a bit more on edge than usual because we really wanted to move to our islands. Restless is probably the best word I could use to describe our feelings.

The Eastern Caribbean Peace Corps staff did a really excellent job of adjusting our training schedules to make sure that none of our training time was wasted as we waited for the storm to pass. They pulled later sessions and taught them early and now they have to readjust the entire 6 week training schedule to make sure we cover all of the material and are able to swear in on time in October. I can’t imagine the multitude of ways that our delayed departure must have interrupted their work schedules for the week but they managed to keep smiles on their faces.

So at 5:45 this morning we loaded the bus for the airport and around 9:30 this morning I landed in Antigua. The Peace Corps Antigua staff picked us up at the airport and took us back to the Antiguan office where we ate lunch and waited for our host families to arrive. My host family is FANTASTIC; I’m so excited about being able to stay with them for the next six weeks. In the house there’s my host mom Lydia, and her 7 year old son Aron (pronounced like Aaron). I got to spend the afternoon with my host family and meet some of their extended family and friends, and we basically had a grand ol’ time.

This afternoon we had dinner at a place in St. Johns called “El Taco Loco” which as the name suggests is Mexican food… though they have pasta and pizza too which confuses me. Afterward we went to the grocery store on the outskirts of town. It’s a brand new grocery store and to my surprise it looked exactly like our grocery stores back home… down to the brand names. I couldn’t help but think while I was roaming the aisles that it would be really easy for me to settle into a nice American routine and never change my food choices while I’m here. I mean, I picked up Slim Vanilla Soy Milk and Kashi Go Lean Crunch for goodness sake! BUT, Lydia has promised to teach me how to cook local Caribbean food so I’m going to force myself to do that as often as possible.

This evening when we got back to the house, some of Lydia’s family and friends came over and they cooked land crab. What is land crab? Let me explain as it was explained to me…

Land crabs, as their name suggests, live on the land and hang out near swamps. The crabs can sometimes be found roaming around fields or crossing the street at night. A brief side note about crossing the street; land crabs are apparently much like deer. If they see a car heading toward them, they stop dead in their tracks and stare at them. So instead of the saying, “Like a deer caught in the headlights” it’s appropriate to say, “like a crab caught in the headlights”. ANYWAY, Antiguans will catch these crabs and eat them. But you can’t just catch them and boil them. You have to catch them, cage them, and then feed them a diet of local foods for a few weeks to make sure that you cleanse their system. After all, you don’t know what a crab on the side of the road eats for its food and you wouldn’t want to get sick from it. So after 3 weeks of a hardy diet of local foods, you take the crab out of their cage, plop it in a pot of saltwater (and sometimes spices) and boil it for 30 minutes. I had a bit of it as it was coming out of the pot and I will say that it’s very tasty. In the states I never was one to eat crab so I had to get past the idea of ripping off a leg and gnawing on it but once I did I got to enjoy its deliciousness. Ha ha ha!

I’m sure there’s stuff that I’m missing from this entry but OMG I am so stinkin’ tired. I will try to update this again soon with more interesting tidbits about Antigua. It’s a beautiful country with incredibly nice people and I’m feeling really blessed to be here.

Goodnight folks!

**A note about acronyms. Peace Corps – like most organizations – uses a lot of acronyms. I’m going to define them for this blog update but next time I update my blog I’m expecting you to know them. =)

We received our site assignments today just before lunch, so exciting!!!! I’ll be working at GARD (Gilbert Agriculture and Rural Development Center) which is an NGO (non-governmental organization) in St. John’s. Here’s what I know…

___________________________

Their Mission Statement:

To build a premier enterprise development facility routed in the agricultural and rural sectors that caters to the training and personal development needs that support the creation and expansion of sustainable livelihoods of young men and women.

Current Activities of the Organization:

Training in business management, skills training i.e. soap crafting, solar drying, tanning, backyard gardening, basketry, tractor driving, farming, agro-forestry, leather craft, beekeeping, multi-media presentations and more.

The center has maintained outreach programs to meet the needs of social groups such as persons living with HIV/AIDS, unemployed women, youth at risk, persons with disabilities, other NGOs and community-based groups.

Proposed Activities of the Volunteer:

• Training in Life Skills

• Computer Literacy Training (Work with IT Tutor)

• Counseling in “Lighter Issues”

• Being part of exhibitions and demonstrations, visibility for GARD

• Agro-Heritage Nature Center (Environmental arm) work with environmental awareness group, biodiversity

• Work with young farmers on educational aspects, certification and record keeping

___________________________

So that’s about all that I know. I’m super excited about my assignment, one of the projects that I was most interested in working on was a computer literacy program and it looks like that will definitely be a part of my work. Also, I think it will be interesting to work on environmental programs and with farmers. I’ll no doubt need to do a lot of research so that I better understand their businesses, but it sounds like they don’t so much want me to be working in the fields as they do want me to help the farmers find more efficient ways to run their businesses. These are all just guesses; I’ll know more when I meet the director of GARD.

In addition to working with GARD I’ll also be working at a primary school. Again, I’m not exactly sure what the school will want me to do but I will find that out next week as I begin shadowing the school during training. I’ll have 3 days of training and 3 days of shadowing with Sundays off for “reflection” until October 15th when we swear in as PCVs (Peace Corps Volunteers). After we swear in I’m not sure how many days a week I work at the school vs. how many days I’ll work at GARD.

Other than getting our site assignments today, we had yet more training in the morning (talking about nutrition, alcohol abuse, safety, etc.) and a scavenger hunt in the afternoon. The scavenger hunt was funny because we were dropped off by bus at the Peace Corps Headquarters outside of Castries and told to make our way to Castries, find a bunch of items on the list, and then make our way back to the hotel on our own. The busses weren’t hard, we asked the locals for guidance and they pointed us in the right direction. The scavenger hunt was a little more challenging. The items weren’t hard to find, what was difficult was the heat. I’m such a baby about heat right now, I know it will get better but walking in the city, with the heat and humidity and traffic and people, I felt like I was going to melt. Luckily one of the items on the list that we had to find was a place called Elaine’s (I think?) and they had yummy homemade Gelato for sale. Three cheers for cookies and cream Gelato!!!!

For the most part Castries is just like any city filled with people. The only two things that were really different from any other city I’ve been in are the DEEP DEEP DEEP ditches on the side of the road which can be challenging to jump over, and tons of busses. Not big busses like you’d see in the states but van size busses that fit about 14 people and seem not to leave on a schedule but rather leave when the entire bus is full. You also have to get pretty cozy with your neighbor because the seats are kind of like long bench seats and on a full bus there are people on either side of you.

Ok, that’s about it for now, it’s dinner time and my tummy is grumbling for food. Dear friends and family, send me an email to let me know what you’re doing (you already know what I’m doing cuz of this crazy long blog entry).

Yesterday we arrived in St. Lucia at the BEAUTIFUL Bel Jou resort and spa. You might be thinking, “wait, did she say resort and spa? I thought she was in the Peace Corps!” And yes, I did say RESORT & SPA! All of us were taken by surprise that instead of staying in the usual conference facilities, we’d be staying at this amazing resort for the next 6 days. The current EC volunteers who had come to greet us emphasized how lucky our group is, they did not get a luxurious hotel when they arrived. And really, I think most of us expected that we’d be staying in a type of dorm room situation with limited resources but instead we get this gorgeous hotel, with air conditioning, delicious food, and a view of the Caribbean ocean. It’s unbelievably beautiful here, seriously unbelievable! What a charmed life we’re all leading this week!

I spoke to one of the Peace Corps staff and asked him how we got to be so lucky. He explained that during Hurricane season the hotels are empty on St. Lucia so I guess the hotel was happy to host our group and was able to give the Peace Corps a reduced rate. It’s a fantastic, albeit incredibly unrealistic, introduction to the Peace Corps’ Eastern Caribbean program.

Last night, after we arrived we had some free time to explore the hotel grounds and chat with the other volunteers before dinner. Some people went swimming, others went for a walk, I took a few minutes by myself to sit in the air conditioning and stare out the window at the Caribbean ocean… all the while thinking, “I can’t believe that this is my life for the next two years”. Well, living in the Caribbean is my life for the next two years, living in a lovely hotel overlooking Castries is definitely not my life. But I’m enjoying every minute of it while I can.

As training has progressed we’ve all gotten to know each other a little more and I must say that our group is so freakin’ cool. You never know what will happen when you throw 28 people from all over the country together 24/7 for 8 weeks but so far we’re managing fine. My roommate commented last night that it’s kind of like a reality TV show; you never know what’s going to happen next. One of our group members – on top of having a masters degree from Harvard – was a yoga instructor prior to becoming a Peace Corps volunteer and kindly volunteered to lead a yoga class while we’re here in St. Lucia. So at 6:30 this morning, a few of us went up to the roof of the hotel and did yoga for about 30 minutes. It was so cool! The birds were chirping, Castries was waking up and every time I opened my eyes to look around I got to see the mountains and the Caribbean ocean. It was beautiful!

After Yoga we took off to breakfast and then we had our first day of training which started at 8:30 in the morning and didn’t end until 4:30 in the afternoon. It was a full day but it went fairly quickly as we had a lot of interactive and small group activities. We received mounds of paperwork to read as “homework”, and we’ll spend the next 4 days going over all of the Peace Corps expectations, principals, safety, and whatever else is in the paperwork that I haven’t read yet. Tomorrow we’ll get to find out where our sites will be located and what our jobs will be, which is super exciting. Even though I’m REALLY enjoying our stay at Bel Jou, I’m also eager to get to Antigua on Sunday, meet my host family and start shadowing at the school that I’ll be working at. All in due time though, right?

Specifically for friends and family…

Internet at this hotel is a little wonky. The only way to get online is to go to the hotel lobby. The nice part of going to the lobby is that it’s an outdoor lobby so you can listen to the birds chirp while you surf the internet. The bad part of going to the lobby is that you’re, well, in the lobby of the hotel. Since the Peace Corps staff would prefer that during training we spend less time online and more time with the other volunteers, I may not do another blog update until we reach Antigua. Also, once I get to Antigua, I’m not sure if my host family will have internet at their home so it may actually be a few weeks until I do another blog update. (Thus this one being so long) So if there’s not an update for a while, don’t be alarmed. I’ll probably write things to post on my blog and do one massive upload once I find internet again.

I miss you all! Thanks to all of you who have written me email so far, keep them coming!

View from our hotel room. Check out facebook for more: http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=5689818&l=5848d803e7&id=721747072

After a VERY full day of staging today, I’m in bed with my laptop trying to write a very quick update about today’s events and what’s coming up next. My roommate, Tiffany, is trying to sleep so I’m hoping that the light from my laptop isn’t too bright for her. =) Blogging only works when you’re consistent, right? So this is my attempt at being consistent.

We got to sleep in a little bit today as staging didn’t start until 12:30. I have to say that I was expecting staging to be really boring but it was actually kind of fun. We played games, talked about how to stay safe as a volunteer, talked about people’s anxieties and expectations for their service, and generally got to know the other people in our group (EC82). I’m not sure if every volunteer group feels this way but I think that we scored a pretty awesome group of people. There was a heck of a lot of laughter going on at training today, and it seems like most people just want to be there to support the other volunteers and the communities that their serving.

As a whole group we’re fairly representative of the U.S. We’ve got people of all ages, from all different states, who have a variety of professional backgrounds and represent a multitude of nationalities. In some ways it’s just cool to listen to people speak. You’ve got southern accents, northeastern accents, mid-west accents, and… well does the west have an accent? =) There are about 35 of us leaving for the Eastern Caribbean tomorrow and from our group it seems like nearly everyone is going to St. Vincent and the Grenadines or St. Kitts and Nevis. I believe that only 5 other people besides me are going to Antigua and Barbuda. With so many people in the room today it was really hard to keep track of where everyone was going but I’m guessing it will become clearer after we arrive in St. Lucia.

After training we went across the street and had Cuban food at this restaurant called “Latin Café 2000” which was pretty decent food, relatively cheap, and had a very patient wait staff. We didn’t plan to have such a large group so we didn’t make a reservation and I think we overwhelmed them a bit. But dinner was fun because it gave us a chance to get to know other PCTs (Peace Corps Trainees) who weren’t at our staging tables today. Again, my first impression, we have a really fun group! So yay for that!

Tomorrow morning we have to be in the hotel lobby at 5:30 in the morning (eeeek!) and then we’ll fly as a group to St. Lucia. I have a feeling it will be a bit of a dog and pony show getting all of the volunteers and our copious amounts of luggage through airports and on busses and finally to the St. Lucian training site. If I feel brave enough to fiddle with my camera during the chaos, I'll post pictures of all of us with our stuff. And man oh man do we have stuff! I've never seen so much baggage. =)

My phone will be turned off tomorrow but I will post updates on my blog as often as I can. Time to go to bed, 4:45 is just around the corner.

I should be sleeping since it’s 1:30 in the morning in Miami but I have to take advantage of the free Wi-Fi while I have it. I landed in Miami around 8:30 tonight and made it to the airport by about 10:00. American Airlines is definitely not my favorite airline; we had a lot of changes and delays that were a bit frustrating but on the upside I made it safely and all my luggage arrived too. So really you can’t ask for much more than that, right?

When I arrived at the hotel and dropped off my luggage I had a moment when I was standing in my hotel room, staring at the wall, and suddenly thought to myself, “I am in Miami because I’m a freakin’ Peace Corps volunteer!” I know it seems like a weird realization to have but I’m told that these things come in waves (and maybe I’m a little slower than other people). It was just a bit surreal I suppose. Having the chance to leave what I know and what is comfortable, to go abroad and learn about someone else’s culture and customs and maybe help them in some way too is something that I’ve dreamt about for years. And now, to actually have the opportunity to live out that dream, I’m on cloud nine. In some ways it doesn’t even seem real, it’s as though I’ve suddenly taken over someone else’s life.

I don’t know what’s in store for me over the next two years but I feel really blessed for the opportunity to have this adventure. It truly is a once in a lifetime opportunity and I can’t wait to see how this story unfolds.

Ok, I’m off to bed. There’s a full day of training tomorrow and I’m sure I’ll want to be well rested for a long day of conference room sitting. Only good things can come from hours long meetings in conference rooms, right? (sigh)

Me in line at LAX with all of my stuff. Two checked bags, a carry-on, and my "purse" (aka another really large bag). I knew before I left that I had overpacked but nothing could be done about it, I took what I thought I needed and that's all that I can say about that. We'll see during service if I really think I overpacked or not.

Tomorrow (8/21) is my last full day of Non-Peace –Corps-Life and it seemed to me that something should be said about that. The question I suppose is; what is there to say? There’s pressure at times like these to be profound and poetic. I’m not sure if it’s actually the case but it feels as though people are looking for me to say something that will encapsulate my expectations for the next two years and set the tone for this adventure. But the truth is that I don’t really have any expectations of what the next two years will hold, and I can’t imagine how I would go about summarizing something that I can’t anticipate or define.

As a planner, it can sometimes be tough to let go and simply see where life takes you. I find that I have to fight my instincts to research, plot and plan all the next steps with the hope that both the journey and its end will be perfect. Rational people (also known as “non-planners”) understand that planning can only take you so far, at some point you have to loosen your grip a bit and let life take over. The Peace Corps process has forced me to stop my persistent planning and figure out how to be flexible and go with the flow. As much as letting someone else take over my life and livelihood feels disconcerting, it also feels incredibly freeing.

On Saturday morning I’ll get on a plane for Miami and beyond that I’m not sure what will happen. The only thing I’m certain of is that the next two years will be exciting, frustrating, thrilling, boring, filled with laughter and probably some tears too. For those of you who are reading my blog, I suppose we’ll find out together what’s in store, won’t we?

“The purpose of life is to live it, to taste experience to the utmost, to reach out eagerly and without fear for newer and richer experience.” (Eleanor Roosevelt)

Tomorrow is my last day at Microsoft and with less than twenty-four hours to go before I find myself walking out of Red-West for the last time (maybe ever?); reality is FINALLY starting to sink in. I packed up my office earlier this week so that’s all taken care of. I’ve documented everything that I could possibly document and have had last minute meetings with everyone, so no worries there. All that’s really left is trying to figure out how to say goodbye to people. Do I resend the email that I sent in July that announced my departure? Do I slip out the backdoor quietly and hope that nobody notices me? Or do I bang loudly on a pot while marching down the hall singing “so long and thanks for all the fish”? This decision of how to say goodbye will weigh heavily on me tomorrow. Thank goodness for Facebook, blogs, and email so that “goodbye” won’t really mean “goodbye forever”.

I have a feeling that everything else from this point forward is going to move very, very quickly. Packing up my apartment will start next week, making sure everything fits into 80 pounds of luggage is also on the agenda, and then of course there are the farewell lunches, farewell dinners, and farewell brunches which have slowly crept onto my calendar. I’m starting to feel that leaving for the Peace Corps is similar to having a seat at your own funeral. Everyone gathers together to reminisce about your life and wishes you well on your unknown adventure. It’s a bit surreal. To me two years doesn’t seem like a long time but I swear a lot of people are acting like I’m never coming back.

With semi-unemployment hovering over my head for the next two weeks, I think that list making will begin in earnest. The trick, I think, is to never let myself realize that I’m between jobs. Must keep busy, must prioritize my life ranking “to do” items from P0 to P3, must remember to add “relax and breathe” to the list, must not freak out, must, must, must…

I’m 33 days away from departure and there’s one recurring feeling that I wake up to every day. Let’s call it the, “you’re forgetting something” feeling. It’s not nerves, it’s not worriedness, it’s not anxiety, it feels more like one of those “d’oh” moments but I simply don’t know what I’m “d’oh-ing” about. That’s probably not the most well-constructed sentence I’ve ever written but hopefully people understand my meaning.

When you think about it, there really shouldn’t be anything that I’m forgetting. Like Santa Clause, I’ve checked my list (at least) twice. And even if I do forget something on my extensive list, it’s probable that I won’t need it or I’ll be able to buy it when I arrive in Antigua. Regardless, the “you’re forgetting something” feeling persists.

In my correspondence with other volunteers everyone stresses that we should “pack light”. I understand why, I’m going to be living out of luggage for the first three months as I go from Miami to St. Lucia, to a host family for a few months and then finally to my final site for two years. Not to mention the road trip that I’m taking with my mom the week before I leave where I’ll have all of my Peace Corps luggage but really won’t want to open it or use it for fear that I won’t be able to re-pack it well enough to get it on the plane from LAX to Miami. I still haven’t figured out what I’ll be wearing for the week that I’ll be in LA prior to departure but I’m pretty much anticipating bring two different outfits and wearing them every other day. The luggage must stay packed at all cost. =)

Having an enormous amount of luggage is more than cumbersome, it’s just downright stupid. Who wants to haul all that crap up hills, on boats, small planes, in vans on bumpy roads? But then people say things like, “Don’t forget art supplies for the kids, and duct tape, and crystal light, and snorkel gear, and notebooks, and, and, and…” the list goes on and on and suddenly my suitcase has exploded with the most random collection of stuff EVER. I did a trial packing run and almost all of my clothes fit into a quarter of my luggage. Everything else was random Peace Corps Volunteer recommended supplies. Packing light seems to be a joke that current volunteers play on future volunteers to drive them crazy. Maybe it’s like a hazing ritual or something? Once I get there we’ll all have a big laugh about how impossible packing light is and wasn’t it sooooo funny how they told us to pack light when they fully understood that we couldn’t?

Other than thinking about packing, there’s not much else going on. I’m still waiting to hear from SATO travel to figure out next steps with regard to my plane ticket to Miami and the staging schedule. It’s weird sitting in my apartment. My brain knows that in less than a month I won’t be living here any longer but all the stuff that surrounds me tells me differently. Nothing in here is packed yet, and frankly I don’t think anything will be packed until the week before I leave.

The weirdest thing for me right now is that in spite of my lists, pre-packing adventures, bon voyage parties, wrapping stuff up at work, etc. – in spite of all of that I don’t think the real weight of the Peace Corps has sunk in yet. My apartment still looks normal, I’m still going to work every day, I still talk to all of my friends, and I get to drive around in my car and run errands just like always. Nothing about my life has changed yet and so the idea that change is coming soon just doesn’t feel real. Maybe when I lock the door on my apartment for the last time it will feel more real? Or when I’m getting on the plane in LA? Or a few weeks into training when I’m surrounded by strangers and sweating through my clothes because I just landed in the Caribbean during the hottest time of the year? At some point reality will set in but until then, I guess I’ll just keep plugging along.

Since receiving my invite to serve in the Peace Corps, I’ve gotten a lot of questions about what exactly it is that I’ll be doing in Antigua and Barbuda for the next 27 months. The answer to that question is actually more difficult than one might expect. The simple answer is that I will be helping Peace Corps fulfill its threefold mission statement:

1. Helping the people of interested countries in meeting their need for trained men and women.

2. Helping promote a better understanding of Americans on the part of the peoples served.

3. Helping promote a better understanding of other peoples on the part of Americans.

More specifically, my job will be in Youth Development. This means that I will likely be working with a local school or non-governmental organization (NGO) on projects targeting youth (primarily at-risk-youth), in areas such as remedial reading and writing, media literacy, HIV/AIDS awareness, and girl’s empowerment. I realize that this definition of my work is extremely vague but the specific projects that I’ll be working on will be contingent upon the expressed needs of the community in which I’ll be serving. As stated previously, I will be in training for the first three months of my time in Antigua so I won’t actually find out details about my community until October (ish).

As with any new job, I have a general job description to guide me but it’s my responsibility to make the job my own. The success of any of my projects will be dependent upon my ability to work well with my fellow community members, remain positive, flexible and most of all patient.

I am unbelievably excited about this opportunity to serve in the Peace Corps. I’ve thought about serving for years and years but until recently it was never the right time. I feel blessed and humbled that the right time has finally come along and that I get to have this amazing adventure at this time in my life. I know that it will be an incredible learning experience both personally and professionally and my hope is that I’m up to the challenge.

I had “the talk” with my manager at work today. No, no, no, not THAT talk… the other talk, the one where I say, “I’ve really enjoyed working here for the last five years but I’m leaving to join the Peace Corps.”

Before I went in to speak with her I got all nervous and had butterflies in my stomach. I’m not sure why, I guess it was partially because I wasn’t sure what her reaction would be. After five years of really hard work, leaving on good terms meant a lot to me. But you know what? She really reacted well. She said that while she was sad to lose me, she knew that this would be an amazing opportunity for me to help in a bigger way than I am now. She said so many nice things about me, my performance and my potential that I was completely caught off guard. As excited as I am to enter into this new phase in my life, closing this current chapter feels weird. I know that’s not very eloquently stated, but that’s the best that I can do at the moment.

In addition to giving notice at my job today, I ran a bunch of errands to prepare all of the paperwork for my trip. I got passport photos done. I went to the DMV to try to figure out why my renewed driver’s license never showed up. I went to UPS to mail in my passport application. I got a form notarized so that I could request another copy of my birth certificate. (For the life of me I can’t find the original and that makes me very sad) All I have left to do is update my resume and finish my aspiration statement, which I intend to do tonight.

The next 4 weeks of work are going to fly by, I know they will. I can’t believe that I’m leaving so soon. I can’t believe that 6 weeks from now I’ll have left Seattle and be living in the Caribbean. Reality has not set in yet but the concepts are starting to slowly seep into my brain and if I’m being honest… they’re blowing my mind. Everything I know is about to change for a very long time and it’s suddenly all happening so fast.

I got my invite today, it came, IT FINALLY CAME! Fifteen months of not knowing where I was going to spend the next two years of my life. Fifteen months of hemming and hawing, of wondering if I’d end up in Uganda, Panama, Kazakhstan or Belize. Fifteen months of sitting on the edge of sanity-ville, staring into crazy-town and then slowly backing away until I found my footing again. Fifteen months folks and the day has finally come!

I’ve been invited to serve as a Youth Development volunteer in the Eastern Caribbean island nation of ANTIGUA & BARBUDA!!! I will leave on August 23rd for “staging” (aka orientation) in Miami where I’ll meet the other Peace Corps volunteers serving in the Eastern Caribbean and then leave Miami for Pre-Service training on St. Lucia on August 24th. Pre-Service training lasts 3 months and will be split between St. Lucia and Antigua. My actual dates of service will be October 19, 2010 – October 21, 2012. So yes, that’s three months of training and then two years of service for a GRAND TOTAL of 27 months in the Caribbean.

The only thing that I feel at the moment is sheer joy! I know that other emotions (sadness, frustration, denial, guilt, etc.) will come rushing to the forefront soon enough, but tonight I’m going to revel in the happiness that I feel at this moment, RIGHT NOW. Deep, lovely, uncompromising joy! And the overwhelming feeling that life just doesn’t get much better than this!

There’s much more to say I’m sure but there’s no time to get into it tonight. Must go pack for vacation, must go read Peace Corps materials, must go write an email to the Peace Corps telling them, YES OH YES, PLEASE, I ACCEPT, I ACCEPT!!!!!!