Hasty Ramblings about my Last couple days in Charlotte/Staging

I made it to Panama! So here’s an update on what I’ve been up to:

First, shout out to a couple of my aunts. The day before I flew out of Charlotte to head to Staging in DC, my Aunt Jackie bought me brunch, and then I went by my Aunt Joan’s workplace, where she got me a couple pairs of flats for teaching. (That’s important, because I have to dress like a grown-up when I teach, and buying shoes in my size in Panama could prove difficult.) Thanks y’all, and thanks to everybody who gave me cards and monetary gifts for Panama!

So the night before flying to DC, I barely slept. After I got ready for bed, I had trouble falling asleep, since I had this irrational paranoia that if I went to sleep, I wouldn’t wake up in time for my early flight. When my alarm went off to wake me up at 5am, I literally thought there had been some mistake—it was 2a, I blinked, and then it was 5—how does that happen? Either way, I brushed my teeth and got dressed, got my luggage together, and was pulling out of the driveway with my mom by 5:30. We made it to the airport around 6, check-in went in smoothly, and then I waited in the line to go through security. . .lemme tell you, CLT was poppin on a Tuesday morning—why was that line so long?

After I waved by to my mom when I went through security, I went to my gate, sat down, and turned on my Ipod to listen to some music while I waited out the 20 or so minutes until my flight boarded. After about 10 minutes, my mom called and asked WHERE I WAS. What?! Needless to say, I hadn’t gone anywhere by that point.

Eventually, I became mobile, made to DC, and checked into the hotel there. Since I was wearing dress clothes, I basically checked in, changed into my sneakers, and headed out the door. I needed to run an errand at the bank and then meet my sister’s boyfriend for lunch (shout out to Dimo for buying me Ihop—that might be my last bite of grits for a while). Afterward, I took the metro back to the hotel and got my paperwork together for. . .dun dunnnn. . .staging!

There are 48 people in my training group, and they all seem really cool. I was worried we’d all be really corny, but crisis averted. I think it’s going to be really fun hanging out with these people for the next two months. There are two different sectors represented by our training group—Community Environmental Conservation (CEC) and Teaching English (TE) Volunteers.

For the duration of staging, which lasted from about 2p-7p, I felt like I was in middle school again. Some things you never outgrow. We did ice breakers (scavenger hunt! Find someone who. . .) and introduced ourselves to the group (What’s something interesting that you packed?) and even identified a class clown (cough: Adam). I think all of us were pretty ready to peace out at the end of the day, but it was nice to get the ball rolling a little bit and officially become Peace Corps Trainees!

After staging, I had a great time with some of the other Trainees. Peace Corps gave us money ($$!) and I went out for Thai food with some of the other Trainees (the red curry I had was delicious), and afterward we got a couple drinks at the bar across the street. It was nice to chill after a long day, and to get to know some of the people in my cohort. Again, they are mad cool! Our training group is gonna be fun.

Downside: We had to be in the lobby by 3:30a in order to leave for the airport at 4a. Eww. Yea, I only got 2 hours of sleep, and then had to heave around luggage in an airport, deal with security and customs, and endure about 5.5 or 6 hours of flying. All of our group is pretty beat right now, and looking forward to the first solid night of sleep we’ve had in a couple of days (several of us shared the pre-staging flight paranoia and didn’t sleep the night before) so I am ready to hit the sack! We’ve got medical and administrative orientations tomorrow in addition to the Spanish interview to assess our Spanish levels. My B.A. is in Spanish, so it’s nice to have one less thing to worry about as far as adjusting to Peace Corps training goes. I’m ready to get the ball rolling tomorrow! I’ll try and keep you all up to date with what’s going on!

I know this post rambled on, but like I said, I am TIRED as mess, so you know how that goes. My eyelids are closing now, so it’s about to be bedtime for me. I’ll update soon!

--Aja