Here at Last

I really wish that I had the time to e-mail each of you individually, but the computers at the Peace Corps headquarters are in high demand.  I'll try to include enough detail to satisfy your curiosity while staying brief enough so as not to bring any of the waiting volunteers to tears.  If you can think of anyone that I have missed on the mailing list, please pass this along.

Our first day here was really a blur. We checked out of our hotel in Washington DC at 1:30 in the morning on Wednesday and spent the first part of the flying and waiting in airports. It was a good chance to get to know the rest of the (tired) volunteers. Getting into Guatemala was much easier than I had expected. We gave all of our forms to one of the individuals from the Peace Corps office and passed through customs without pause. We loaded our luggage into vans and hopped on a bus to the Peace Corps headquarters.  It is a beautiful compound, and very secure. We spent the night in pairs with host families. I am with another girl in the Community Tourism group, and I could not have asked for a better family for my first few days in Guatemala.  They have two children; an eight-year-old girl and a three-year-old boy. Their home is beautiful and cozy.  I'm sleeping in a lovely bed, and there is a bathroom with a shower attached to the room. The water isn't always reliable, and the showers are usually luke-warm, but I am in love with Guatemala already.

Yesterday was filled with lots of rules and regulations.  In between all of that, we had interviews in Spanish to determine our beginning language level. So far, that has been the most nerve-wracking part. I must have done better than I thought because I ended up in an intermediate-high group.  We are divided into four-person groups according to our Spanish level, and tomorrow our groups will be sent out to our training site where we will work with a language instructor in Spanish and work as a group on a small assignment to help the community.  I have been assigned to a project in San Bartolome Milpas Altas working with a park to develop promotion materials.  REMEMBER this is just the project that I will be working on during training in my group of four.  I am still a very long way from knowing what my permanent project will be.

Salud!

Morgan