Here in the big V!!

So I'm here in Vanuatu and things have been going good so far. I'm staying at a campsite with my fellow volunteers. We have running water and electricity until 9:30pm. So we're living the high life right now.  And the beach and the most beautiful clear blue water I've ever seen is only about a 30 second walk from our camp! I got a cell phone with is really weird. I didn't expect to get one but we are all on a plan where we can call or text other volunteers and staff for free so it sounded like a good idea. On Friday we move out to our training villages and we get host families that are like real families, our Mama's and Papa's will refer to us as daughter or son. which I think is really great and SO cute!

This week we've been doing a lot of training and we've started our language classes. Bislama seems like a really easy language to learn to speak not so much to write and luckily we'll probably only be speaking it! Monday night we went to the Country Director's house for dinner and tried kava. Kava is a local cultural drink made from a plant. It makes you feel kind of drunk. It kinda taste's like dirt and it numbed my mouth right away. I didn't start to feel drunk until about 10mins later and then it was intense! I felt completely gone. The bad thing is the next day I felt horrible. Nauseous all day long. Not a happy day yesterday. But kava here is sometimes only a man's drink so I'm hoping I'll be in an area where is not a common drink for women. But sometimes when you meet the chief of your village he'll welcome you with kava in a ceremonial setting, if women are allowed to have it there. If that's the case I will drink it again but that will probably be it!!! What's weird with Kava is that the more you drink it the more it affects you. It's not like drugs or alcohol. You don't build up a tolerance.

But anyways, I'm in the city today meeting with the medical staff. I got 4 shots and started my anti-malarial pills. After this I'm going to go shopping for some essentials.


I don't know if I'll be back near Internet service for a while. I'll have some funny stories (I'm sure) once I live with my host family for a while. Language barriers are always funny!!

Ok, ale tata!

It's Time

So I'm in my room (freezing!!) trying to finish up packing everything and stressing out about weight limits. I leave for my staging event in about 6 hours and it still really hasn't hit me that I'm leaving soon. I think it's because I haven't seen my plan ticket so I'm not that excited...... yet. I just want to give a few shout outs:

To my family: I love you all so much and I want to thank you for all of your support!

To my EDEL-Oers: ooo-OOO!!! I will miss you crazy kids so much and I love you all!! Get it!!!

To my Ashley: I love you, I love you, I love you!!!!! I'm going to miss you so much and you have to keep me posted on you life!

I'll try to keep ya'll as updated as possible and I promise that all of my particularly ridiculous stories will end up here! To be continued......

It's Becoming Real

For the past week I've been volunteering at the Central Regional Little League tournament for the Little League World Series and due to early mornings and late nights I have only been able to check my email today. And in my inbox surprise surprise, there are emails from Peace Corps. reps telling me about my staging event coming up in September.

Things like itinerary for the event ( in L.A.!!!)  and for leaving for Vanuatu. And everything just became so real! I got to thinking about everything I still need to get for the trip and do before I leave! Like learning a bit of Bislama before I leave (thought I do have a 12 hour flight to occupy).

I'm getting so excited about it all and cannot wait to go!

So right now I'm trying to get everything put together to go, saying goodbye to friends and family, and hoping I don't forget anything!

The Very First

I've been thinking about the best way to share all of my crazy stories that are bound to happen while I am living in a new country, a new culture, and with a new language. And it hit me: blog. So this is where I will be posting my crazy experiences as the two years unfold (unless I'm not allowed to have a blog!).

First up I would like to address the question: Aren't you scared?
Apparently Vanuatu has 7 active volcanoes, sharks in the waters, cyclones, high chance of malaria (especially living there for two years), rats, and lesser living conditions (obviously). So I have gotten the 'aren't you scared' question a few times now. To be truthful, I am more scared about traveling on a plane on Sept. 11 than anything that country can throw at me right now. However, once I get safely to Vanuatu I'm sure the other fears will pick up!

As a side note I will only be able to get an internet connection in the larger cities so this blog might turn into a once a month thing once I get to my placement village. But more on that later!