Travels Toward Happiness: Nice to meet you Samoa

Talofa!!

Hello! I made it and I am well. After a long 10.5 hours I have landed on the island of Uplou in Samoa. This place is gorgeous unlike anything I have ever seen. However before I get into my life so far in Samoa let me start by talking about the dreaded leave and goodbye of my home and family. So rewind to 3 days ago. My parents drove me to the airport. The whole way there my head was filled with emotions and I couldn’t stop thinking about how much I was dreading saying goodbye to my family. When the time came I hugged my parents, cried, and for a split second wondered if I was making the right choice. The second passed, the hugs ended and I knew I need to take those steps towards my plane. Even though it hurt and I was sad I knew I was doing the right thing. I boarded the plane and headed for staging in L.A. Staging is when the Peace Corps group meets at a specific location to meet each other before heading towards their post, or country. I spent the night in a hotel and the next day was bombarded with filing out paperwork and getting briefed on what to expect when we got there. Although the meetings were long and tedious I enjoyed staging because it allowed for me to become more familiar with the people in my group. Who, by the way, are all pretty cool. Then on Tuesday, October 5, 2010 my group of 20 boarded the plane to head towards Samoa. 10.5 hours later we were here. I was exhausted. I don’t know about you but I CANNOT sleep on a plane, and to top it all off we arrived around 6 am so I had to wait until that night to finally get some sleep. Therefore, I had been up for more than 30 hours. Nevertheless, I was enjoying myself. When we arrived at Peace Corps headquarters we had an Ava Ceremony. It was our welcome ceremony into the country. Other PC volunteers came in to welcome us as well. Afterwards I had information meeting one after another. That night me and a bunch of people from my group went out with some of the other PCV’s. I know I know I could have very well have gone to bed, but c’mon I couldn’t pass a Valima (Samoan beer) and a time to bond with the new people in my life! This all brings me to today. Today has been spent doing training. The weekend is coming up and I’m excited because I will get more of an opportunity to explore the town and get to hang out with the other PCV’s. I’ll try and make my postings pretty regular but training makes me sooo busy, so patience would be greatly appreciated. J