Three Days Grace

At last, the Peace Corps blog is up and running by popular demand! (Read: the demand of three people.)

If you were expecting this post to be filled with exciting stories about scorpion bites and soccer balls to the head, I'll have to burst your bubble with the news that I am not yet at my post in El Salvador. In fact I'm still sitting in my room in Cheverly, Md. My 27 months of Peace Corps service start in three days with a two-day orientation in Arlington, Va. Seriously. My orientation could have been anywhere in the country, and it had to be 20 minutes away from my house. I had to call the travel agency to say I wouldn't be needing a flight to orientation, and the agent was genuinely confused.

Agent: How are you getting there?
Me: My mom is driving me.
Agent: Will you need reimbursement for your miles driven?
Me: Sure, you can give me like five bucks.

Until then, my life is a whirlwind of packing and farewells. Today was my last day as a volunteer gardener at Behnke Nurseries in Beltsville, a job I took to prepare for my agroforestry/environmental education role in the Peace Corps. I genuinely had fun at that job and will miss my wonderful colleagues -- and I learned a lot about plants! If you ever want to know how to grow spider plants or save Brazilian Fireworks or crape myrtles from untimely deaths, I'm your girl. And working outside in long pants during the hottest days of summer prepared me doubly for field work in El Salvador. Too bad the Peace Corps won't give me a little walkie-talkie to radio for help when I don't know what to do.

I walked out of work today with lots of blessings and two offers of part-time employment after I return (why not?) Many of my co-workers knew I'm leaving soon and had lots of questions, which I'll answer again now for the benefit of you readers.

Alia's Peace Corps FAQ

When do you leave?
Like I wrote above, my pre-departure orientation starts Sept. 14 and lasts two days. Straight from there, I hop on a plane to San Salvador (the capital of El Salvador, if you slept through 7th grade) Sept. 16.

Then where will you be?
For the first three months, I will be training in San Vicente, a city kind of near San Salvador (a two-hour bus ride away.) According to the Salvadoran Spanish professor I had last semester, San Vicente is a good-sized city, but more rural than the capital. I assume my group is training there because it would be harder to plant and compost and all that good stuff in the capital. After training, I will probably go to a still more rural village, where I will remain for two years, although I could switch villages if I complete all my projects or if the first one they assign me doesn't work out for some reason.

Can you come home?
Yes, kind of. I can't go anywhere for the first six months or the last three. I get sweet federal-government vacation time (an accumulation of two days per month) and can use those days for a trip back to the States, but I would have to come up with the money myself (donations will be taken at my goodbye party! Kidding.) I can quit whenever I want, but I wouldn't bet on that happening!

What will you be doing?
I don't know for sure and probably won't know until near the end of training. And even then, over the course of my service, projects will start and end and everything will be in flux. My official job is, like I said, agroforestry/environmental education. From what I gather from other Peace Corps volunteers, this means I will probably be assigned to a school. I guess I'll be holding classes and workshops on recycling and environmentally sustainable farming practices like composting and "agroforestry" (planting trees for the good of the environment and other crops.) I will probably also do field work in those areas and will start secondary projects like English classes and youth groups. I'm determined to teach a drama class as well or even put on a village play. You can take the girl out of the theater but you can never take the theater out of the girl!

Are you nervous?
No.
Seriously.
And I can't figure out why not. By all accounts I should be terrified by the prospect of going to a strange country known for civil wars and gang violence, doing work that has nothing to do with the degree I so recently acquired (journalism? What's journalism?) But here's what balances all of that out:

• I won't be alone. I train with a large group of new volunteers who apparently will become close and supportive friends. I don't doubt that -- after all, I spent a semester in Spain with a group of strangers, and I couldn't have made it through without them.
• I've traveled extensively before, even in Third World countries. I've never been to Latin America, and spending time in Bangladesh and Vietnam won't automatically prepare me for this much greater challenge -- but from those experiences, and from my semester in Europe, I've learned how to handle the frustrating aspects of lengthy stays abroad.
• I minored in Spanish and have a good working knowledge of the language and the culture throughout much of Latin America. Since I got assigned to El Salvador, I've been doing my best to learn everything I can about that country specifically.
• The Peace Corps seems to devote the time and resources to prepare me for the challenges I might face. If you know me well, that might sound strange coming from me -- the sometimes cynical aspiring journalist with an innate distrust of the federal government. But our training also incorporates things like cultural adjustment and health and safety, so I feel like I'll be able to handle things.
• I'm really excited!!!

Will you be able to keep in touch?
I better be!!! I have reason to believe I could have Internet access a few times a week, between school and visits to Internet cafes or whatever. Or I could end up getting online as infrequently as once a month. But I really want to KIT with everyone as often as possible. Snail mail is another option, albeit a less reliable one. And I am 99% sure I will have a Salvadoran cell phone. But that's the main purpose of this blog: to keep everyone who is interested informed about my life in the Peace Corps. And I would love it if you all would comment or email me individually and keep me in the loop about your lives too!!!

So that's my future in a nutshell. And it's weird -- as I drove home today I literally felt like I was reviewing my past. I drove past the University of Maryland, where I just spent the best four years of my life, walking through the old-fashioned brick buildings and grassy fields and dashing across Route 1 to the bars with my friends as I saw all the students doing today. And then through Cheverly, where I grew up in a quiet, close-knit town with a few thousand others who perpetually bike or walk their dogs under a continuous canopy of huge trees.

I'll miss it all, but I can't wait to describe San Vicente to you in a similar post five days from now!

Besos (kisses),

Alia

(The packing is not going so well.)