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Wednesday, March 24, 2010

So it begins!

I finally started my blog!! I've spent yesterday and today playing around and making sure it has all the features I want :) Maybe if I'd taken more programming classes I could have designed my own sweet backgrounds, but I'm pretty happy with what I found!

Well, I leave for Burkina in 74 days!! I really cannot believe it is coming that soon, because I feel like I haven't even started preparing. The first week I found out I submitting my passport application (I will get a second, government employee passport. Kind of like a secret agent!), my visa application and emailed my country's Peace Corps desk my resume and another aspiration statement. Up until that point the people working specifically for the Burkina Faso placements and such didn't have any information on me, so I hope I made a decent first impression. The only Peace Corps paperwork I am still waiting on is re-submitting my dental paperwork once I get my wisdom teeth out. So that will be fun. Other than that it is a lot of little things that you wouldn't really think about: renewing credit cards, driver's license, and anything else that will expire before August 2012. I have a lot of loan paper work to get started on as well, which I suspect will be about as much fun as getting my wisdom teeth out, minus the painkillers.

Since I sent out my last mass email stating that I was officially in, I haven't been officially been told any new information, but I've been doing a lot of blog stalking of other volunteers and think i have a pretty good idea of what to expect for training at least. The first 3 months of my 27 month commitment will spent training with the group of volunteer starting the same time as me. At the end of training I will be officially sworn in as a volunteer (PCV), up until that point i'm only a trainee (PCT).
I'm guessing the training group will be 15-20 people, but I really won't know until I get there!! We will be training around Ouahigouya (the northern of the two cities marked on the map to the right. The other city is the capital, where I'm guessing I will fly in). Part of training is spent at the PC training center, but for most of it the group is split up to live with host families. The purpose for this is to help us adjust to the culture and language sooner than if we all just stayed together. The host families will not all live in Ouahigouya, some may live in smaller villages outside the city. Once again, I'll find out when I get there!

My placement is officially to teach math at secondary school (anywhere from 7th-12th grade). But I know that all African PCVs do some work with Health Care. I'm not sure exactly what i will do for this yet, i think a lot of that will be determined by the specific needs of the community where i live. Burkina doesn't struggle with HIV/AIDS as much as other countries do, most of the health problems there are malnutrition and dehydration (because of diarrhea from unclean water). The average life expectancy is only about 45, while the US life expectancy is about 75. So as much as Africa needs advanced medical care to treat the HIV/AIDS pandemic, they also just need clean water and food. (I will provided a water filter from the Peace Corps for my water. It is very unlikely that i will have running water at my house, i will most likely have to transport it from a well.) I don't know the specific village/town i will be teaching in yet (and i won't until about halfway through training), but it is unlikely that another volunteer will live in the same village as me. In the village i may live with another host family or i may have my own place. Either way, it's my understanding that i will have my own stand-alone building, probably just a single room. Most of the houses there are set up on compounds, with many buildings inside a locked gate.

Well, i feel like i'm starting to ramble, which is always a good time to stop. If you have any questions, email me! I would, as always, love to hear from all of you too! This next week my family is going on vacation to Florida, so it will be nice to relax a little and see my grandpa before I leave!! We are also going on a short cruise (my first), so that should be pretty fun :) I'm sure I will update several times before i leave, but once i get there, it may only be about once a month or so (i also don't know what my electricity/internet situation will be yet). But like i said before, only 74 days until i leave!! and i know it will fly by!