Finally here!

I have been in Morocco for a little over 2 days now and I'm in love. We got into Casablanca around 7 in the morning on the 3rd and then they herded all 71 of us on to the super nice charter buses to Marrakesh. It wasn't too bad of a drive only about 2 hours. After we got there, we checked into this hotel with bungalows. Soon after while we are all very jet lagged, we have our first meeting in country. Met the staff, talked to the country director. The staff seem great and just very excited to have us all here.

Anyways I'm trying to keep this short since it's almost time for dinner and it smells wonderful. (I'm using wi-fi in the cafeteria in our hotel, that overlooks the main town square) I'm smelling wonderful food, watching people at the shops along the square, and listening to the busy chatter of other trainees.

A couple of things!

-I saw the mountains for the first time and drove through them. Beautiful!

-Found out the only really eat couscous on Fridays, their holy day.

-Palm trees everywhere?! Had no idea there were palm trees.

-Listened to current volunteers answer questions on a panel today. Awesome and overwhelming.

-Find out what language I have to learn tomorrow. Eek! So the Berber dialects and Moroccan Arabic (Darija) are completely different! Whoof.

-Get along with my roommates wonderfully.

-The food has been good! Interesting for sure. No bad digestion problems yet! (I'm sure it will come soon enough)

-I had the most amazing orange I have ever tasted! Screw Florida oranges. They are growing on trees all over Marrakesh and in season now. Delicious!

-I've dabbled in using my French in a shop. haha It didn't go that well.... haha He was selling canaries and spices. So cool seeing the spices in these huge barrels.

**Hope all is well in the homeland.

No Sleep

So it's a little after 3 in the morning and this seems to be my usual bed time lately. My body has slipped back into a very bad sleeping pattern that has allowed me to accomplish next to nothing. Fall asleep anywhere from 3-6 and sleep til noon-2... Bad news bears.

Well when I closed my eyes and thought I was ready to fall asleep, I found myself counting down the days til I leave in my head. Only 17 left? After that I thought about all the stuff I still need... good pocket knife, travel adapter, flash light, find sleeping bag, etc. Then I started thinking about who I was going to try and see next weekend.

My head won't stop thinking, planning, worrying, and hence I'm still awake. So why not blog right?

So I just want to write out a few things I think I will miss the most and on the other end, the things I am most excited to try/start when I get to Morocco. I want to do this sort of for my own record, just to see how much this will change when I get there. Let's put some data down to compare and review at a later date! (I miss school.) Also this list will be minus all the obvious things... I will miss my family like crazy I'm sure, I'll miss friends and friendly faces, and "home" in general.

I will miss....

-being able to call my mom with stupid little questions. No more mom 411 or googlemap mom. Dang!

-MY BED.... it's truly the most comfortable bed I've ever had... maybe why I sleep in so late?...

-walking on campus (granted I don't do that often now, but I sure love it when I visit)

-camp this summer. I hope I never forget how hard and amazing that experience was.

-Sushi! Hope I find some places in Morocco.

Well I found making that list a little hard.... honestly besides missing being able to talk to my family, friends on a regular basis, there isn't too much. I really hope I don't end up missing internet, my cellphone and TV too much. I'll be happy if I end up in a region with very limited access to all of those. Down with my old habits of watching way too much tv and too much time on the internet!

Most excited for...

-The scenery. Sorry central Illinois, but you are very boring. No more cornfields for me thanks! Bring on the beaches, mountains, busy markets, and Sahara please.

-bargaining in the markets.

-learning Arabic and testing out what little French I know. Je parle francais! Je veux un livre et une pomme, si vout plait. (That'd be cool if a vendor sold English books and apples together. That phrase would come in handy then).

-living with a host family. I love my independence and privacy. This will be a great experience for me. A true test and the best way to learn the language.

-meeting other volunteers. It'll be nice to have people who will be able to relate to this life changing decision to join the Peace Corps. I wonder if any are as crazy as me... We shall see.

-I can't wait to find out what health issues I might be able to help with or teach about, but I really look forward to doing woman empowerment groups. Also, I'm really interested to find out what rights and supports peoples with disabilities and specials needs have.

-if I end up in a farming area or basically not in the desert, I hope I can have my own garden or help with the family garden. Who knows! Maybe a chicken too. (I was so disinterested in this as a kid, but now that I'm going to another country, I can't wait for the possibility).

Well that's some of what I'm looking forward to. Listing everything would just take too long. Also I hate to have too many expectations. I don't want to end up disappointed or get too far ahead of myself. I'll be happy where ever they decide to place me.

Time for bed...

Bonne Nuit!

Less than one month!

In about 26 days I will finally begin my new adventure! Of course it still doesn't feel real. I've been waiting what seems like forever.

So I just want to do a short recap of my Peace Corps journey thus far...

I went to my first Peace Corps recruiting meeting my junior year of college and almost immediately fell in love with the idea. I wanted this so bad that it took more than a month or so to put together my application. My worries and hopes were limitless. I knew it was a hard time to apply. The economy sucks, so more applicants and less money for new programs to open. I was afraid my odds of getting in weren't good.

I turned my application in, January 09. Within two weeks I was contacted for my interview! Which went well, because for me there really wasn't anything I wouldn't do to have this experience and I was ready for it.

I was nominated in mid February! I remember just leaving volunteering at Carle and I had a missed call from lady in charge of the Chicago office. I immediately called her back for what I thought was a follow up interview. She let me know right away that she was nominating me and that she found a few programs I qualified for. Needless to say it took everything in me to not run around the hospital screaming and yelling and jumping for joy. After our phone conversation, I became nominated for a health program in North African/Middle East region and it was scheduled open around February/March 2010. Long wait... but at the time I thought no problem, plenty of time to practice language and save up for traveling.

After that I went through all the fun medical appointments, tests, finger printing, blah blah. I finished all of it in almost exactly a month. Then off my tests and medical info went to D.C..

At the end of March, I started waiting..... and I've been doing a lot of that ever since.

It wasn't until August that I found out I was medically cleared. Then about two months later, I received an email from my placement officer and who would decide if I was really qualified for the program I was nominated for almost 10 months earlier.

I thought this email meant that my file was being reviewed and within a few weeks I'd know if I had been invited to volunteer or not. I was wrong.... it took almost two more months after that first email to receive my invite, but believe me, I was ecstatic.

It's been a year and a month since I first applied to the Peace Corps and now I'm almost at the end of this part of the journey. Soon the new and most exciting part begins. Service! I've put my life on hold for almost a year. Most of the time spending it in a limbo of not knowing if I would be invited to leave or not.

I just can not wait to leave. There are plenty of people and things I will miss, but I feel like this opportunity in Morocco is the beginning of the amazing path I want my life to take. I can't even imagine how it will change me or my goals in life. I just know that I want to do the most I can with my life and unfortunately I've felt lost for a while now. I think this will be the experience I need to push myself and really start to live up to my own expectations. So any family/friends/strangers who end up reading this blog, I hope you will enjoy following my stories and keep in touch. Who knows where this adventure will lead me...