My Journey Starts Tomorrow!

This week has been crazy!  Everyday this week has been spent running around getting things ready to depart, working with my dad, or visiting with friends and family. Overall it's been a blast.   I'm very happy that I was able to see so many people before I head out on my 27 month journey (which begins TOMORROW!)   I can't believe the time is finally here for me to depart, and I couldn't be more excited.     Everyone always asks me "Are you nervous or scared?"   and the truth is not at all!  except for the classic fears of "will I make friends, will people like me, and will I succeed"  the only emotion I feel overwhelming is excitement.  I'm going to be living in a foreign country, learning a whole new culture, learning a whole new language, and seeing sights that I've never seen before, I feel like I'm making out like a bandit here.  :-)

Tomorrow at 9:20am I'll be boarding a plane to Philadelphia where I will be participating in a staging event (the pre-orientation and paperwork event I suspect).   After hanging out in Philly for all of 16 hours all of the Mozambique education volunteers will be getting up around 2am to catch a 3am bus to JFK(why staging wasn't at a hotel near JFK is a conundrum for me) where I will fly out of America heading to Johannesburg on a 15 hour flight, once we land there will be a small layover and then a quick  1 hour flight to the capital of Mozambique, Maputo.   Once there I will spend 2-4 days at a hotel going trough a general orientation session before they ship us off an hour north to 10 weeks of training.    (So 1 week from today I will be in Africa, living with a host family, and starting my training classes...Awesome!)  

My communication will be very limited the first 3 months I'm in Mozambique because of where I will be located and my schedule, so everyone should operate under the idea that no news is good news (straight from the little PC handbook they give us to tell our families :-P ) 

Take care everyone!  The next thing I post will be from Africa!! :-D

One more week to go

I've got seven days before I head over to Mozambique for 2 years and I'm getting more and more excited every day!  

This past weekend my family and I took a trip to the Adirondacks where we stayed in Long Lake.  Long Lake has a little history for my family in that my grandfather built a cabin near the town of Long Lake on a smaller lake in the region known as Lake Eaton.  The cabin that my grandfather built in the 1970's was sold in 1998 however we enjoyed going to the old cabin and seeing what had become of it (It seemed to be in great condition!).  We rented a cabin for the weekend right on Long lake and had a great time hiking Owl's Peak, playing Mah-Jong and eating lots of Turkey soup that my mother made. It was a great weekend and the last time that the four of us will be together for awhile given that my brother Jeremy had to head back to school (The University at Buffalo).  I really enjoyed the weekend with my family and I am looking forward to all of the things I have planned before I embark.  In 9 days I will be in Africa!!!! :-)

Back in Syracuse with 2 weeks to go before I leave

After a great vacation in Washington State (Thanks to Landon, Sayuri, Christa, Bobby and Matt)  I'm happy to say that I've arrived back in Syracuse and am enjoying being back at home.  I've hit the ground running with all of the paper work and packing I need to do and I'm hoping that before my family heads out to the Adirondacks for the weekend that I will be packed and have my paper work finished so that I can use my last week in the states to relax and say "see ya later" to everyone.

There seem to be so many little things that need to get done before you head out of the country for an extended period of time.   I've got a whole slew of paper work to be done specifically for the Peace Corps on top of getting my credit card and debit card information figured out, arranging a power of attorney, loan deferment, arranging to have property and and life insurance, obtain my transcripts from UB (Which you wouldn't think would be too hard but with the new computer system they have..... )   arranging to vote with an absentee ballot, and then finally (and most important)  seeing as many friends and family members as possible before I go.    It's a very exciting but busy time.

Vacation in Washington and getting ready for the Peace Corps.

Right now I'm enjoying a week long stay with a good friend of mine from college, Landon, and his wife Sayuri in Lakewood, Washington. The day I arrived was on Sunday Sept. 4th and I spent the afternoon enjoying the sights and sounds of Seattle and eating at some interesting restaurants. I met up with two friends of mine from a research group I was in while attending the University at Buffalo and we enjoyed a great lunch at a place called 'Pan Africa'  I had dish called Piri Piri that was delicious.   After grabbing lunch with my research buddies Sayuri, Landon, and I walked around town for a bit stopped a cute tea place near the water and went on to have a great dinner.

On labor day, Landon and I enjoyed a great hike on the Fort Lewis Army base where we encountered what seemed to be a forest of black berries, that we later came back to with Sayuri to picked an obnoxious amount of black berries that happened to be some of the sweetest berries I've ever tasted.

So far my trip to Washington has been an excellent change of pace from the summer job, that I just finished up on September 2nd.  I was working as a Camp Director for the Delaware Family YMCA in Buffalo, NY and though it was a very rewarding experience where I learned a ton about working with kids and being a supervisor it was also very tiring and draining ( Kids wear you out!).  The weather here has been beautiful with crystal clear skies  (which offer an amazing view of Mt. Rainier) and warm weather.

I'm using this week as a 'calm before the storm' type of vacation because when I get back to Syracuse on September 11th I am going to be spending the majority of my time visiting with friends and family and preparing for my departure to Mozambique.  I'm extremely excited at the moment to be in the process of packing, and tying up my loose ends in preparation for my two year excursion abroad, but it can be a daunting task at times.

I'll be heading over to Mozambique on September 28th after a brief orientation in Philadelphia on the 27th. The following 10 weeks once I arrive in Mozambique are going to involve a rigorous training schedule that will work on getting me up to par with the Portuguese language and on my ability to teach in a large class room environment.  My job description as it stands now has me teaching math for the two years I will be in Mozambique.

There is a lot to learn on the road ahead and I am excited to get started!

Welcome!

This is my first post on my new blog!  Welcome, the goal of this blog is to help myself document the day to day, and/or week to week happenings of my life, and to keep family and friends informed of my whereabouts.  I hope you enjoy the posts.