Turning Point

Hi there. I haven´t updated a substantive blog entry for a couple weeks now due to a variety of factors--I spent a whole week outside of site in the field (last week), and this week I have had a lot of stuff going on. But I have some great ideas for things to write about so I promise I will have something entertaining on here soon.

Stay tuned for stories from the field, and a couple funny things that have happened to me in the last couple of weeks. Living in Africa definitely means that even when things are at their most boring, they are still interesting.

I am at a turning point in my Peace Corps service. I have now been in Vilankulo for almost three months and am starting to figure out how things are going to work in terms of living here for two years and settling into my role at work. I am constantly learning new things and am still far from settled in, but things aren´t brand new anymore. I am leaving site for this entire upcoming week to return to Maputo (the capital city, about, I don´t know, 10-12 hours south of here, maybe more) for a week for Regional meetings with all the other PCVs in the southern provinces (Maputo, Gaza, and Inhambane). It should be a really fun time to catch up with friends I haven´t seen since training, and also just be encouraged in the realization that we HAVE come somewhere from those training days! Maybe I will even go to a good restaurant and eat good food and get a frozen margarita or something! And we are staying in what looks like a pretty nice hotel so I will probably even have hot water (!!!!!). It should be a great time and I hope to return to Vilankulo refreshed, encouraged, and ready to start this next phase of my PC service.

I am entering the ticket lottery for the World Cup in 2010 this month--it is open until the end of March and then we find out if we got tickets or not on April 15th. I am so excited and I will be so mad if I don´t get them! It´s an amazing opportunity with the WC being in neighboring South Africa, so I am looking forward to that. I am definitely going with my roommate, Sarah, and perhaps some other PC friends and friends from the states (!) If anyone reading this is thinking about going, let me know! We are going to try to get tickets for games in Cape Town.

In other far-away news I am trying to book a ticket for the States in December. It is really far away, but I know that I want to go back to America for the holidays, especially because it will have been 15 months since I left the country. And if I book now, it will cost me less than $1500 to fly home, which is hideously expensive but much better than the $2500+ that many people pay. Once I have any plans finalized I will inform the world through this little piece of space on the interwebs that I proudly call home.

I will post an update from Maputo. Until then, fumba kuatsi.