For now

I am now a certified Peace Corps Volunteer. Training group 29 swore in on Friday, April 17th. The ceremony was nice enough; it felt like any normal graduation ceremony minus my family in the front row trying to make the camera work, causing me to laugh hysterically during my speech. This time I made it through my speech just fine, though. I’m sure it helped that it was in Otjiherero, a language I have a very weak grasp on, and I really had little idea what I was saying or if my pronunciation was even close to accurate. According to some of the audience members, though, we really sounded good so I guess I faked it pretty well.  

Here are some pictures from swear-in.  Anika, my dear friend and Otjiherero partner in language/crime, seems to be in most of the pictures I post on here.  I thought I’d introduce her since you’ll be looking at her so much.

This is (from left to right) Benna, Anika, Me, and Richard, our Otjiherero language trainer.

These are some of the wonderful ladies in my training group at the ceremony

It was quite unpleasant saying goodbye to my fellow trainees. I consider myself a fairly independent person, but I’ve gone from having a support network of 20 other volunteers who I saw virtually every day for the past two months to being in a new town with no other PCVs and little work to do. Peace Corps has a policy that we are not allowed to leave site for the first three months we’re here, meaning that I won’t see many of the other volunteers until Reconnect sometime in July. Total drag.

The move to site was uneventful, save the nasty flu I came down with the night before, making me a little uneasy about spending five hours in a truck with precious few places to stop for the bathroom. My entire first weekend in Groot was spent in bed watching the first season of Weeds.

I won’t say I’m homesick, but some recent news about home has made me take pause and really examine what the hell I’m doing here. Peace Corps has always been something I’ve had in the back of my head that I wanted to do, but I was pretty passive about it. “Live in Africa for two years? Sure, why not? I can handle it.” Now, I feel as though I need to figure out why I want to be here and how the next two years will be better spent here than at home. I won’t come home early, that’s not what I’m saying. I just feel like I need to be a little clearer with myself about what I want out of the next two years. Something I probably should have figured out before I signed up, you say? Yes, you’re probably right.

I am really quite happy here, though. My days are spent meeting people and getting to know this town and my evenings are spent reading and writing. I met Celia, the new VSO in my town today. She’s English and will be working in the physical therapy department at the hospital. She’s very open to working on projects with me, which I appreciate, an once I move into the nurses home I’m sure we’ll hang out a lot more.

Totally random, but I have eaten more peanut butter in the last two months than I think I have in my whole life. I absolutely can’t get enough of it. It’s probably the drop in protein that’s causing my body to crave it like mad, but during training there were times where I ate peanut butter for every meal. I thought I’d be burned out by now, but I still want it all the time. Mmm, peanut butter sandwich…

Just today I received another wonderful care package from my mom. I’m laying in bed typing this, surrounded by candy and protein bars, Vanity Fair and Spin, glucosamine, Tapatio, and three glorious pounds of whole bean French roast. Damn, my family knows how to send a proper care package.

I’ve updated the blog with my mailing address, should you be inspired to compete with my mother (good luck…)

All my love.