The city of brotherly love.

Tonight rounds out a long and great day in Philly, where our training has officially begun! I left the house at 5am this morning to catch my flight from Chicago to Philadelphia, and I ended up arriving at the hotel around 1:30pm, which made me one of the first people to get to the staging event. I took advantage of the hotel's free wi-fi, since we probably won't be getting much of that once we leave the states, and waited for other volunteers to show up. Right away I went out to lunch with some fun guys who had also come early, and soon more and more people were showing up. It turns out there are just over 70 people in my training class to Ghana, so plenty of people to meet and mingle with! I went out to dinner with a different group of people and soon realized that 1.) there are a lot of people from out West (Colorado, Utah, etc... ) and 2.) There are a lot of math and science teachers! As a health/water and sanitation volunteer, I feel slightly in the minority, and I'm still fairly unsure as to what my job is going to entail once I get there... But I guess that's why they give 3 months of training, right? The rest of the night consisted of paperwork and meeting new people. It's a little comforting to know that nearly everyone else has the same apprehensions as I do, and that this whole trip hasn't really sank in for most of us yet. When there was a lull in the dinnertime conversation, someone said, "wow, isn't it a little strange that soon we're going to be real friends? Training together, traveling together, visiting each other?" And I think that sentiment basically sums up my feelings right now. I know a lot of these people will be my closest friends over the next 2 years and my support system to help me stay grounded to home, and it's weird to think that this isn't just summer camp, but that we're all starting new chapters of our lives together at the same moment in time.

In closing I'd like to share a couple of important lessons I have learned today:
1.) The people of Ghana are called Ghanaians, pronounded "gah-NAY-ans" (with an emphasis on the "nay")
2.) One of the languages spoken in Ghana, one that I will will at least be learning a little bit of, is called Twi, which is apparently pronounced "twee"

Well this is all for tonight. Tomorrow we will have training all day in Philly, which includes LOTS of vaccinations that are apparently administered "military style," meaning that our arms are going to be killing us tomorrow after all the shots we're getting! :)

~Katie