Sunday, June 9, 2013
A LOT has happened since the last post. I returned to Heredia and went through the
final weeks of training, swore in as an official Peace Corps Volunteer, and am
now officially in site where I will be for the next 2 years. The biggest of those events was obviously
swearing in, so I’ll mainly focus on that during this lovely update to all of
your back home.
If you’ve ever met me for more than about 10 minutes, you
probably know I’m not a big feelings person.
Don’t ask me to talk about my feelings and if you’re talking about
yours, I’ll certainly be wishing I were anywhere else. This has often led my mother to tell me I
have no soul if I don’t cry at movies when a normal person would or when I
refuse to have heart-to-heart conversations.
It just isn’t me. And while we’ve
constantly been told PC would be an emotional rollercoaster, I didn’t really
know if that would apply to me. But I do
have to admit, I uncharacteristically broke down in tears twice on swearing-in
day and was overcome with so much emotion from the outpouring of support I
received that I guess even I am not immune to the PC emotional rollercoaster.
PC volunteers are told to bring one nice outfit with them to
country and swearing-in day is the one and only day you will most likely ever
need that outfit during your 27 months.
On Wednesday morning, I woke up insanely early, put on my referenced one
nice outfit, made sure the faux-hawk was perfectly gelled, frantically finished
packing, and tried to eat one last breakfast with the fam but was far too
nervous to actually eat. Luckily, I do
actually speak a bit of Spanish these days so I was able to explain to them why
I couldn’t eat so they didn’t freak out and think I was sick or something like
they would have 3 months ago when I didn’t eat.
I lined up all my luggage at the door as my fam was going to have to
bring it all to the ceremony with them and I said goodbye to my 2 sisters and
brother at the house. I ran out the door
as Naty’s Mom pulled up to take us to our bus (I totally busted my ass on our
apparently wet tiles) but we made it to San Isidro in plenty of time to catch
the bus. Once all of Tico 25 arrived, it
was off to the Ambassador’s residence.
Now the best and worst part of this day was the fact that I
was giving the speech on behalf of our training group… in Spanish. I was sick to my stomach and it wasn’t made
any better by our arrival and finding out that a name needed to be changed in
my speech, so I spent the next 10 minutes memorizing how to say a new Latino
name and the respective title.
Thankfully though, the ceremony went extremely well and I think the
speech was a success. There were
certainly a few tears in the audience and from Tico 25, so I’ll take that as a
win. The Ambassador praised my Spanish
and I couldn’t have felt luckier to have been given such an opportunity.
What made the day so incredibly special was the fact that
the ceremony was livestreamed. I am
truly blessed to have so may people who wanted to watch and for having the
greatest office who totally took over the chat.
It was beyond overwhelming to check my phone after the ceremony and have
received a screen full of texts from PCVs in country, more WhatsApp messages
than I could count from friends back in the states, and a list of emails from
family, friends, and coworkers saying congratulations. Every text, email, and Facebook message made
me realize how lucky I am to have so, so much support and I was simply
overwhelmed with gratitude for having such amazing people in my life. Being able to share swearing-in day with all
of you back in the states made it so much more special and definitely reminded
me how much I miss you all!! I was able
to get 2 phone calls in after the ceremony…one to Mom at school and one to Team
Lance in DC. I did break down in tears
on the phone with Team Lance (I guess I just miss you guys too much!) but it
was fantastic to be able to talk to many of them in the office. I spent much of the day having quick chats
with so many people back home and again, for any of you reading this, thank you,
so so much for all of the kind words last Wednesday and for simply taking the
time to be apart of it with me. It meant the world to me.
I had to say goodbye to my training host parents after the
ceremony which was definitely no easy task when my dad started getting chocked
up. But we said our goodbyes and it was
off to San Jose with all of Tico 25. We
all spent the night in San Jose together at a hostel (where they had a buffalo
chicken sandwich, so I was clearly in heaven) and the next morning was filled
with even more goodbyes as we all departed for our sites… Talk about an emotional 24 hours.
Tico 25, Official Peace Corps Volunteers!
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