So I havent blogged for a month and I totally don't apologize haha. I don't apologize because it is nearly impossible to put into words the sights, sounds, smells and experiences that I have while I am here, but I'll try my best.
So since my last blog post I finished Home-Stay and I am a little sad because I really grew to like my family there, but hopefully in two years right before I come home I can go visit them once more. After we left Kabe for the last time we went back to T-So the training center and then we had one final week of hellish tasks and 8-5 training sessions. This all led up to the culminating moment of Swear In. I have already described to a lot of you my feelings during swear in in personalized e-mails but for those of you that I did not have a chance to contact, it was nothing short of amazing. The speech given by the US Ambassador to Mali was very moving and the whole process was so cool. But now that is all over and I am officially a Peace Corps Volunteer.
My new home is almost surreal. Each day I awake take a 5 block walk to the store buy a loaf of bread, come home fry up three eggs, make myself a strong cup of El Pico Coffee, and then read for two hours. At around 12/1230 I go to my host families house and hang out drink tea, eat lunch, read more, try to speak Bambara, then eat freshly barbecued corn. I go back to my house around 5 or 6 to either work out or get ready to go play soccer with my host brothers. I go back take a bucket bath and then eat dinner and read more. Journal and then finally bed. This is my routing pretty much 7 days a week. I am slowly trying to adjust the idea of inactivity for two years, but the idea of traveling all across West Africa is interesting and definitely something I want to look into.
So now the deeper part of the blog post.
...My three months in Mali have taught me some absolutely incredible things. Things about the value of success and happiness, love and friendship, and how to truly appreciate all that I left behind. Many of these things I have gone into much more detail about in my journal which one day I will happily pass to anyone who wants to read. What it boils down to overall though is that this is an "experience" and its an amazing one and something I will never forget and something I will always have. No one can take it from me and even if no one ever wants to hear about it after I leave this will forever be burned to my soul. You think differently here, you see things in a different light, life is just flat out not the same, but in every way possible its the same thing I did back home.
Now for random rants and thoughts
...I want to travel all over yet call one place home. I want to get my Psy D and become a clinical psychologist, have a private practice, be an expert witness for the DA, and write books. I want to have an apt in Boston, a house in New Zealand, and a villa in Spain or the Canaray Islands. I want to own a vineyard, I want to get married and have kids. I want a female black lab and name her Ewing. I want to go hiking across the mountains. I want to read every book I can possibly find. I want to be a public speaker, I want to give speechs to my fraternity about the joy of serving others. I want to be me...If It Is To Be, It Is Up To Me.
Conjugati Amicitia
Vindicat Honore
Et Ducti Vero
Vivimus et Vigemus
United by friendship,sustained by honor,
and led by truth,
We live and flourish.
