Staging

After a rushed few weeks full of friends, family, packing, and goodbyes, I finally became a Peace Corps Trainee. My last few days in Chicago consisted of final purchases, packing, and a lovely going away party thanks to Muffin Pie, Chris, and Doug (thank you!). Last Sunday I flew to DC and had a final night with my DC friends, including one last Washington Carver milkshake from Open City (the third time I justified the expense since it would be the ‘last one til 2013.’) Monday at noon I started staging, or orientation.

I found staging to be very well orchestrated, and everyone seems really awesome. We were given a lot of information to process and a lot of names and faces to remember. There are about 65 of us in our group. Yesterday, we did a lot of sitting and waiting (they’re preparing us for Mali) and received our Yellow Fever shots so we could enter the country. We got to the airport about 5 hours early, but it was necessary, as many people had trouble with the weight restrictions. (Luckily, I squeaked by). At 10 pm, we departed for Paris. The flight was uneventful, and now we are waiting in Paris to go to Bamako. It is the last step before we finally get to Mali.

I’ve been through a lot of emotions in the past few days, but ultimately, I am really excited for my upcoming adventure. We seem to have a really good group of volunteers, which helps put me at ease. I don’t know when I’ll be able to post next, but until then, I hope all is well in the States and that Chicago’s Blizzard of the Century that was brewing when I departed didn’t end up being as bad as they predicted. Ciao.