5-4-3-2- Blast off!!!

The day has finally arrived. Well not quite, but tomorrow I will be departing from beautiful California to the hustle and bustle of Washington DC for a one day training. Then from there off to the Dominican Republic where I will spend the next 3 months training for my position as a health extentionist, learning the culture and customs, and brushing up on my Espanol, olay!. Thennnnn October 31, 2012 I will swear in. Marking my two years of peace corps service. I dont think I have said this enough, but this is all crazy! Crazy in such an es tactic good way. My bags at this point are packed minus the little things here and there like my rape whistle (hehehe), bobby pins (those little suckers always manage to get lost), reading books (one magazine for my last American inspired style even though I am not the fashonista rather the whateverfloatsyourboatthatday -ista), and random etc. that are lying around my room at the moment waiting for a home in one of the 3 luggage's. I have packed my life for the next two years in less then 80 lbs. Pretty dang good! Oh and at the moment I am forking out nutella. By the fork fulls. If any of you know me this is a pretty good sign I am either sad or stressed. Hahah but a good stress. Also another good sign of my stress is I am all over. So if your reading this now and it sounds jumpy or just not well ordered or even not making sense or relevant... stress!Aside from that my smile is ear to ear. I am ready to take the leap into this next adventure and serve our country in a positive light. This is such an incredible opportunity that has yes, been a long process, but deep down I feel like it will be one of meaning. Look forward to pictures, and I'm hoping videos since I am more of a dynamic individual. Thank you to everyone who has supported me in this journey, whether it may have been a coffee date, a text of goodluck, a facebook message of safe travels, or even a silent prayer...thank you! I appreciate it all of it more then words can express. Fill free to tag along the way. Ask questions, voice concerns, or add funny commentary! (but be nice and mindful ;) ) Id love to hear how things are going at home and what my journey looks like to all my friends and family. Muah Muah! Love you

Packing this little life away

Forgive me for not keeping up! I must remember to give this thing some love. Since my last post my room has become a complete utter disaster!!! Piles on peace corp piles (clothes, gadgets, etc.)..home depot boxes line the hallway and don't even get me started on the stuff Ive accumulated in the back of my trunk. For the ohhh past month one corner of my room has been dedicated to Peace Corp stuff the other 3 corners have slowly but surely been filled with boxes. Boxes!? Yes boxes. I'm putting the energy out there that when I come back from the PC perhaps life may have another destination for me. That other then with my loving, oh so grateful and giving, caring, safe and secure, did I say amazing parents. Crazy I would even think about moving out sheeshh butttt!! this little inter/independent baby they raised must spread her wings eventually some day...with no safety net included. That being said the process of putting what I have accumulated for the past 23 years of my life into boxes has been a process..a slow one at that. I am only at 2 large and 1 extra large box. I feel so emo at times when I start attempting to pack. Ill put on some sad songs, force myself to eat chocolate, and begin shirt by shirt. Hahah no really its not that dramatic but! I must say going through elementary school love letters, tennis uniforms, and endless doodles of high school and college notes is pretty entertaining and distracting from the main goal. As I pack my American life here, I am excited to be able to minimize the necessities of what I will need in the Dominican into 80 lbs believe it or not. Less is more and more is less right!? My one and only baby sister has left less then two weeks ago to study abroad in Chile for a year. Seeing her journey up until the day we said goodbye at the airport has been a great example and preparation for what is to come for my next step in life. She keeps asking "has it hit yet?" the feeling that you will be leaving for two years! To be honest...NO! Reality is I still feel "normal" and feel as though "hey cool..I'm doing the peace corps! ..how freakin exciting is that"...Ill get these lotto moment excitement spurs...but nothing sooo ginormous like crying yet haha. Not yet at least..but I know its coming. I have booked my flight as of Thursday the 12...this has kicked my packing butt into gear. As I write this I think I'm feeling it...all my energy is in it right now and thinking of it now and holy freaking cow!!!! a month and 3 days from today I will be out! AFUERA! GONE! SEE YA! DEUCES! PEACE! CHOW! Holy cow a month and 3 days!!! hahah this is wild. Its such a whirlwind feeling. Bittersweet. Exciting. Scary....just a whole bundle of pop rocks in my stomach. Ok sooo for now! I shall keep at packing..enough procrastinating ..I soon will post pictures of my progress and where I am at in this process in a more composed  post. Happy Monday.

Blue package..red alert! Blue package has arrived!

On April 20, 2012 I was finishing the last bit of an online course. My recruiter had notified me that my invitation would take about 7 to 10 business days to arrive in the mail as of the 13th of April. So when Friday afternoon came, I thought..DANG IT! "business mail" definitely wont be showing up until Monday. It was around 6pm when...a big oh so beautiful brown UPS truck stopped in front of the house. I thought oh it must be a package for my dad. NOPEEEE!! WRONG WRONG WRONG! I about jumped on the UPS dude "YES, oh my gosh! its here." Poor guy! He asked something along the lines of  "are you ok, is this the correct address." I rambled "its for the Peace Corps, grabbed the package and hopped, skipped, wiggled back inside." I was shaking! I felt like I got proposed too or a feeling of that magnitude haha. I opened the packaged slowly!! BOOM! I didn't even read the opening, the paragraphs in between, the closing, or even recognize the emblem of peace corps. DOMINICAN REPUBLIC! You will be serving as a health extensionist in the DOMINICAN REPUBLIC. Chaaaaahuuuuuu!!! I about went bonkers! Called all my close friends, blew up my parents phone, until finnnnaaallllyyy someone answered! I'm going to the Dominican! La Republica Dominica.

"Ay que bueno ("oh good")! your set! ay diosito ("Oh God")is so good..you are already  use to Honduran beans, and platanos fritos ("fried plantains"), ayy que bueno, the food is similar" Was what my mom said immediately after Congratulations.  Im glad she is relieved that I wont be starving, eating possum soup or something extremely "different" hahah. Everyone else had such a great and supportive reaction. Thank you.

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 Sooo two months later and officially a college graduate I am beyond excited for August to come around. My departure date from California will be the 20/21st and from the USA to the DR 22nd. It is an overwhelming feeling. Excited, nervous, more excited, more nervous, and the pattern continues. But more excited then nervous :) . Since then Ive been doing a hell of a lot of research: history, gastronomy, culture, Ive even YouTubed how Dominicans speak. Ive heard through various people and sources that the Spanish there is very different. Dominicans have there own lingo and speak very fast. If you dont speak Spanish, this might be a little hard to get the gist of what they are saying and if you do! buahahah tu sabeeee!! es cosa seria :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qdnkx3VnmAs

My mom warns me " no vengas gritando" ("don't come back yelling".)  Its almost like English. There are different accents: country, British, Australian, Boston, each have there own tone and little corks to them. I'm stoked to just be speaking Spanish for 2 years straight! 

& still dun dun dun!

...Oh by the way, I was asked why I wanted to join the Peace Corps in my application and here is what I wrote somewhere past midnight and in between 4 am:

My reason for wanting to join the Peace Corp interestingly enough began in the 6th grade. Pretty astonishing for a 6th grader to want to make such a commitment so far ahead in life! Since the 6th grade Peace Corps has been one of my biggest goals in life. No, not to say “I did it,” but because

ever since the six grade I understood the expectations and believed in what Peace Corps stood for. Moreover the journey to now and actually following through with this process brings me much excitement and anticipation. You see, my father was a Peace Corp volunteer. Every so often he would share his own adventures and lessons he learned through his time in Honduras. I was always left amazed, uplifted and inspired to one day live a story like his. As I matured in life I came to realize what is important and what I consider valuable in life. “..Leave it better then you found it,” “Every person comes with a lesson,””inch by inch it’s a cinch, yard by yard life will be hard,” “I am another yourself, you are another myself,” and so forth were quotes that inspired my everyday life and challenged me to live a life of optimism despite the pessimism so many contribute too.

Given the opportunity to serve I hope to gain knowledge of how neighboring people of this world live. I want to share what I learn with my own community as well as contribute what I can to improve the lives and community of my host country. I like to believe everything happens for a reason and is a lesson towards life. Upon challenges and/or uncomfortable experiences I am on to make light of it. You only live once right! Might as well look at the brighter side and make the most of what you’ve got. That being said I aslo believe that in order to make it from start to finish the support and help of others is key and essential to my success. I understand as a Peace Corps volunteer there will be moments of solidarity. However the connections one may makes with a host country and its people are extremely important connections that will exceed your term. These connections and daily experiences will help through other challenges in life and trigger hopefully a domino effect of helping others where one can...

And there it was lady and gents..sent! Within the week I received a call to come in for an in person interview,responded to some follow up emails and the rest there after was history :)  So for the past year and some months I followed through with the grueling medical process. Every inch, hole, molecule, atom was checked! ...and rechecked! scanned, injected, weighed, examined, you name it. This for most is the most difficult part of the process since it does take time, money, and above all patience. Furthermore once all was said and done I felt like a gosh darn healthy human being..... after addressing anemia, an abnormal white blood cell count, and upping my vitamin intake. Finally getting the a-o-k from the peace corp nurse that I was 100% ready to go forth with my process was I think one of the biggest steps forward. Pheeewwww! Now where to and when was the next expected step. Before I go onto this next step in the application process I must say there were times I questioned if this way of giving back and seeing the world was for me, and not just because my father did it. Thoughts of missing out on other opportunities, losing friends, skipping out on important events, possibilities of what ifs, could this, etc. etc, etc, passed my head. With these thoughts and doubts I decided to slow down my anticipation and take the time to really think about this commitment in the middle of my medical process. My best friend also suggested I take the time to really make sure this is what I wanted so that if it was for me I live every breath of this opportunity enjoying the hell out of it! and shoot not to mentions its a once in a lifetime experience, why not! what did I have to lose!? I don't think it was even a month, February I texted, Erika "Im doing it" right before work :) IM DOING IT!!! oh my gosh IM DOING IT!

Welcome...this is where it all begins..dun dun dunnn

Hello, Hola and welcome, welcome, welcome to my little blog. For the next two years and three months I thought Id share this next chapter of my life. For all of you who already know this opportunity, the Peace Corps, has been something Ive long wanted since middle school. Middle school!? Dang, right? Its been a long time coming and everyday I still cant believe its happening in less then a hundred days, eeehhhh. Before I ramble on at 100mph let me share with you a little about this decision. Bare with me for those who know it like the back of their hand, I think you all know who you are :). Here goes:

My father back in 1985 became a Peace Corps volunteer and spent his time serving in San Marcos, Santa Barbara, Honduras. During his time of service he met my mother, a Honduran elementary  teacher. Growing up hands down I got the best bedtime stories. No Mr. Humpty Dumpty, Cinderella, three wolves and a girl in red status stories. I grew up on the adventures of my father an American in a third world country and the daily life of a conservative yet influential Honduran lady. Stitching up eyeballs, having cockroaches tickle your back side in a port-a-potty, etc. Gnarly and pretty rad! oh not to mention their stinkin cute fairy tale love story, which someday I hope to write a book about. OK seeee..100mph side tracked. So as I was saying growing up hearing stories from my dad I was intrigued by the adventure he had not to mention the impact he made in my mothers small town.  As I got older and realized the importance of helping others and giving back .I made the conscience decision to one day apply. It is during my college years I began to learn more about our world and our relationships with it. I learned a lot of good as well as a lot of disappointingly bad stuff. On a side note I am fortunate to have a mother who is not from here and once had negative views of America due to its history with Honduras.

During my time in college as a History major (now Spanish) I was able to understand more in depth why her views on this country were the way they were and the importance of international relationships. The United States is one awesome country in many ways, but it is not the only awesome country. We as many (countries) attribute to a beautiful world and it is important to recognize this. We all need each other in one way or another

.Soooooo on the night of February the 27th after a long day working in the restaurant business I sat down on my laptop and did what I normally did. Checked my mail, browsed through Facebook, read the funny missed connections on Craigslist, and browsed the web. Impulsively and spontaneously as I can be I decided out of nowhere that night I was going to apply. At 4:27 am the next morning I submitted a few essays and my application. DONE! SUBMIT! Whatever life has here after is now up to the person on the other side of that screen I thought. Closed my laptop, giggled inside at what had just happened  and went to sleep.

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to be continued.....




**PS. I must apologize for ANY and ALL grammatical errors I may make I am quite the cluts at writing.