Induction!?

Induction is coming tomarrow....and its about time. I will be officially off of my probation period and be a full corps member. If I have to sing anymore songs or do any energizers (summer camp songs or activities involving screaming) I might lose my mind! Then again I can't complain too much since all of my living expenses are covered. Besides that there isn't too much goin on here. I did fall in a river the other day though, that was kind of fun. At least until the hypothermia set in. We were in Baltimore checking the water quality of the storm drains and wading through a river. I decided it would be fun to play in the mud (which had a quicksand effect) and I fell over into the cold water...oops. It was funny and no equiptment was damaged.
I leave for Biloxi Mississippi on the 7th of March. I am quite excited for this because we will be two blocks from the beach and the weather will be in the 70s and 80s!

more....

I swear this blog will be about me somday. Training is really boring and not too much happens, for example I sat around all presidents day weekend and finished the book the Borne Identity while being sick (the book wasn't bad....much different than the movie, more in depth).
Anyways I was awoken at five forty five this morning by a call from Uganda! It was Lisa! She has a cell phone and has just moved in with her homestay family. They seem like really good people so far which is always good to her. Most importantly though she is enjoying herself.
I do have some news, today I will be working at food bank in Havre De Grace (the town across the river to me) it sounds fun and like it might be more meaningful than our last service project. (it was trail maintenence but it seemed futile and almost destructive since we were cutting down perfectly healthy live trees).

Lisa update

For any who are wondering about how Lisa is doing....... She sent an e-mail a few days ago to some people (she had limited computer time). Her flight was delayed for three hours out of JFK airport in New York so she missed her connecting flight to Uganda in Brussles. Since flights to Uganda only fly out every three days or so from Brussles she was stuck for several days. Not all bad though she spent several days eating choclate and drinknig beer in Belgium. She should have arrived in Uganda friday afternoon. It may take a while though for her to find her bearings and find a phone or internet.

Goodbye Lisa!

The day has finally arrived, Lisa is going to Africa!! She departs from Brussles after her three day delay and will land in Entebee airport some time this evening. It will be sad to see her go but she has wanted to do volunteer work abroad for as long as I have known her and now she is finally going! I am so happy for her. She has a blog set up (paxlisa.blogspot.com) to document her experiences and keep people updated easily. It might take a while for her to update it since she will have to become oriented in Uganda and find her way around while training and becoming acustomed to a different lifestyle. Good luck Lisa! I love you and am so happy for you.
Things here are good. I just returned from Philadelphia to visit Lisa. I saw independence hall, Philadelphia old town, and Chinese New Years celebrations in Chinatown. Most importantly though I got to see Lisa one more time before her departure. It was sad to say goodbye but well worth the trip! I finally found out what my new assignment is. We are going to Biloxi Mississippi to build houses for hablitat for humanity. We've heard rumor that Jimmy Carter might even show up one of the days we're building (how exciting would that be!!!).

Week 2

What a week (even though it is only Wednesday). We have finally received our team placements. I am on Raven (as in the bird) Six. The team is ten people plus the team leader. Everyone is very nice and pretty easy to get along with. This week has been filled with mostly training, including a 5 am physical training secession this morning (blah). Tomorrow, luckily we get to do a service project in a state park near Baltimore removing non-native species of plants. It will be a nice change from just sitting around in lecture halls and classes all day.
The beginning of March is when our team will start our first assignment. I'm hoping we get to go somewhere in the gulf or where the weather is warm and not cold. I shouldn't complain about the cold though. The Chesapeake Bay area is not nearly as cold as Denver. There are lots of cloudy days and fog, but that is to be expected being so close to a large body of water.
Most of our training takes place at the University of Delaware. It is a very pretty school located in the town of Newark, which is a very neat little town with lots of interesting stores. The UD's mascot is the Blue Hen. What is strange though is that the Hen (a female chicken) is made to look very masculine on all the school paraphernalia.

I'm very excited because today I made preparations to go the Philadelphia to visit Lisa as she starts her Peace Corps staging. I am quite happy to be able to see her before she begins her adventure in Uganda. It is going to be sad to see her leave but I'm very excited and happy for her. I'm also excited about the prospect of being able to visit her after I'm done with Americorps.