Finally made it! After saying goodbye to Mom, Dad, Catie, Robert and Megan at Denver International Airport I wound my way through security. Thank goodness they didn't make me unpack everything in my backpack. If they had, I think I would have started crying, packing sucks. Once I got to the terminal, I was found by Mary Hansen, a fellow Malawi PCV who is also from Denver. Thankfully we were flying on Southwest, so we didn't have assigned seats and I had some company on the flight.
After we landed in Philly we heard someone a few rows back say, "yeah, 2 years is a long time." Now, when you are in the Peace Corps, "2 years" is a magic number so we perked up but didn't see anyone, and wouldn't meet them until later. So we hauled ourselves to the baggage area and forced our way out to where the shuttles pick you up to go to different hotels. In a world of black rolling luggage, PCVs have a tendancy to stand out. You see a small group of 20-something year olds wandering through an airport weighted down under about 80 lbs wirth of stuff and you put two and two together. So that is how we found, Ross (the mystery person on our flight), Robert, Cassie, and Katie while waiting for a bus.
During our check in we found out that the PC gives all the volunteers $120 to get them through the weekend. Wooh!! So several of us went and walked around near the hotel to find a place for dinner. It's interesting here, to the left of the hotel you are in the Asian district of Philly, but if you go right you are surrounded by Irish pubs. I bet St. Patrick's Day is pretty interesting around here, the jokes probably all start with, "A priest and a buddhist walk into a bar...". Anyway, we found a pub not too far away and had steak, really good steak too. The last decent steak I am likely to have in two years, let us have a moment of silence for our dear friend. *sniff*
Today we got up bright and early and went to get our Yellow Fever vaccination. Let me tell you, there is no early morning eye opener quite like a shot of live virus in the back of the arm, forget espresso. Which brings me to now. It is about 11am and we are having a break before going back to pre-service training until 6:30 tonight. Then it is going to be a mad frenzy of stealing as much toilet paper and tiny soap bars from the hotel as we can and packing for a 15 hour flight...yay.
So, until 2am I am in the City of Brotherly Love where it is rainy and windy. Don't expect a whole lot in the way of blog posts or email until mid April. Want to get a letter? Then I need your address, unless you already gave it to me. If you come across someone who was not aware of my departure make sure they know that rumors of my demise have been greatly exaggerated.
Love you all very much!
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