Momo-san
Peachy!
Hello from Tanzania!
Most folks who actually know me have known about this through Facebarf but I thought I would pop in here, while I still have wifi, to let the barfs in on the news.
About 8 months ago I started down a road to run down a dream of mine (a dream for the last 6 years anyway). I applied, interviewed, and was invited to serve in the United States Peace Corps, Tanzania. I took the entire week I was allotted to decide, to check the "yes" box, because once I say yes to something like this I am committed.
Fast-forward to today, I am sitting in a room in Dar es Salaam after about a week of travel, orientation, and crash-courses in kiswahili. In 2 days we will all move on to the capital city of Dodoma for 10 weeks of intensive training: skills for the specific program we are working in (I am in sustainable agriculture), learning how to integrate into Tanzanian life and culture, and more, more, more kiswahili.
After that, we will be sent to our village sites where we will stay (alone, yet not alone), try our best to integrate into the community, and facilitate projects that will (hopefully) help the people in the village/region.
Right now, all of us trainees are in the honeymoon phase, it's like we are on a vacation. This will change soon; we'll be living with strangers that will soon become our family, we'll live without electricity and running water, we'll get frustrated, lonely, and really want a burrito. But, I'll still have cellular service and interwebs now and again so I'll pop in to let y'all know what's up once in a while.
Why did I do it? I think you can all imagine why. How did I do it? I had to wait until my kitty-cat passed away, which she did do last year (FUCK cancer)...otherwise I had nothing holding me back. I knew if I didn't take advantage of the opportunity now, the chance might disappear. So here I sit in Dar, sweating buckets, happy as I've ever been in my life.
Most folks who actually know me have known about this through Facebarf but I thought I would pop in here, while I still have wifi, to let the barfs in on the news.
About 8 months ago I started down a road to run down a dream of mine (a dream for the last 6 years anyway). I applied, interviewed, and was invited to serve in the United States Peace Corps, Tanzania. I took the entire week I was allotted to decide, to check the "yes" box, because once I say yes to something like this I am committed.
Fast-forward to today, I am sitting in a room in Dar es Salaam after about a week of travel, orientation, and crash-courses in kiswahili. In 2 days we will all move on to the capital city of Dodoma for 10 weeks of intensive training: skills for the specific program we are working in (I am in sustainable agriculture), learning how to integrate into Tanzanian life and culture, and more, more, more kiswahili.
After that, we will be sent to our village sites where we will stay (alone, yet not alone), try our best to integrate into the community, and facilitate projects that will (hopefully) help the people in the village/region.
Right now, all of us trainees are in the honeymoon phase, it's like we are on a vacation. This will change soon; we'll be living with strangers that will soon become our family, we'll live without electricity and running water, we'll get frustrated, lonely, and really want a burrito. But, I'll still have cellular service and interwebs now and again so I'll pop in to let y'all know what's up once in a while.
Why did I do it? I think you can all imagine why. How did I do it? I had to wait until my kitty-cat passed away, which she did do last year (FUCK cancer)...otherwise I had nothing holding me back. I knew if I didn't take advantage of the opportunity now, the chance might disappear. So here I sit in Dar, sweating buckets, happy as I've ever been in my life.
