When Others Say It Best...

"If we do not offer ourselves to the unknown, our senses dull. Our world becomes small and we lose our sense of wonder. Our eyes will not life to the horizon; our ears will not hear the sounds around us. We pass our days in a routine that is both comfortable and limiting. We soon wake up to find we have lost our dreams in order to protect our days. Fear of the unknown and the lure of comfortable space will conspire to keep you from taking the chances you should take.

"But if you take a chance, you will never regret the choice. To be sure, there will be moments of doubt when you stand alone on an empty road in the pouring rain, or when you are ill with fever in a rented bed. But as the pains of the moment will come; so will they ever fade away. In the end you will be so much richer, so much stronger, so much happier, and so much the better person for having taken risk and hardship. There will be nothing to compare to the insight you have gained."
--Kent Nerburn

All That You Can't Leave Behind

As my departure date gets closer (just one week left now), my preparations have turned from practical to panicked. I am constantly debating which luxury items I cannot live without for 27 months. One "must-have" is music, as my ultimate tool for relaxation and coping. Luckily, with the invention of the iPod, pretty much any music I can get my hands on can be packed weight-free. So, I have decided that in order to be completely prepared, I need to download every record and CD in my house to my iPod.

The journey of unpacking my parents' old albums (LPs), and my brother's and my inaugural CD collection has been quite entertaining. And as much as I believe that my preparation for Africa is officially complete with the addition of Coolio's sophomore album to my iPod, I must soon turn procrastination into productive packing.

My most-recent CD import is the U2 album appropriately titled, "All That You Can't Leave Behind." Pondering this title has since inspired not only this post, but my packing. The hard part is fitting those things that I can't leave behind in my 80-lb allotment. Frustration sets in as I realize that simply rearranging items in my over-weight bag is not working, I must choose a few more items to unpack.

I have a feeling that I will be repacking until the morning of December 2, when I will be forced to make those final decisions.

Training Update

This week I found out a little bit more about my assignment and training. I will be leaving DC on December 3rd for Addis Ababa, the capital of Ethiopia with my trainee group. There we will spend 3 nights in a hotel continuing with pre-training activities. Then we all travel to Ambo where we will each move in with a host family and begin our 10 weeks of intensive training.

I am very excited for this long-awaited adventure to start!

Preparing For Ethiopia

After graduating from Furman University last spring, I have decided that the Peace Corps is the right ‘next step’ for me. There have been many long discussions with close friends and sleepless nights trying to decide what to do after graduation, but all in all it seems like this organization is a perfect match for me. The Princeton Review book Best Entry-Level Jobs calls Peace Corps "the perfect job for the globe-trotting idealist in each of us." And, well, that pretty much sums up my aspirations.

About My Assignment

December 2, 2008 I leave for Ethiopia, where I will live and work for 27 months. My official job title is Community HIV/AIDS Volunteer. Upon leaving, I will have a two-day orientation in Washington D.C., and then 10 weeks of training in the town of Ambo, Ethiopia. After training, I will be sworn-in as a Peace Corps Volunteer and assigned a town/village where I will work for two years.

I currently have less than three weeks to physically pack up my life and mentally prepare myself for what I assume will be the toughest, yet most rewarding experience of my life. After backpacking through Asia last summer, I feel significantly more comfortable with my level of patience and adaptability, but I hope to build upon those lessons. I have no doubt that this experience will shape me as a person and teach me more than I could imagine.

About Ethiopia

I recently came across a paper I wrote last winter for my “Women and Health” course about the poor health conditions in Ethiopia. I do not remember researching Ethiopia specifically, but there it was, a self-written plan-for-action detailing simple solutions to Ethiopia’s health problems. If someone had told me while I was writing that paper that less than a year later I would be living in Ethiopia with the opportunity to put those solutions to work, I would be speechless.

According to the UNICEF world health statistics, over 1,500,000 people in Ethiopia are currently infected with HIV. To give you an idea of their health education, only 54% of men, and 39% of women know that a healthy-looking person can have HIV.

I get to help change those statistics. That’s cool.

About my adventures to come…

You can check back here for updates on my preparation, and adventures through Ethiopia! I will leave you with a quote about Ethiopia that both confirmed my excitement, and secured my anxiety for my upcoming adventures:

“Testing, awe-inspiring and heartbreaking – a journey you’ll never forget. You don’t explore Ethiopia for a relaxing getaway, you venture here to be moved. And moved you shall be.” –Africa Lonely Planet