Thoughts 2

When I arrived in Philadelphia after an unremarkable flight from Detroit I started to meet the group that would be everyone I knew (or so I thought at the time) for the rest of my PeaceCorps experience. Kelly from U of M was the first, and Mary from Northern Michigan the second. They where easy to spot in the airport, overloaded with baggage, confused, and without a clue, just like me. Eventually after a few phone calls, and asking just about everyone wearing a uniform we figured out how to get to the hotel where the pre-training was happening. After arriving at the hotel and meeting with all the people that where already there I went with a group to get some breakfast and see the liberty bell which was only a few blocks away. Everyone seemed nice enough, and we all made the polite little chit chat that one engages in when meeting for the first time.

The whole experience in the hotel conference room was a little strange. It seemed like the introduction to some cult or something. Everyone sat at round tables wearing name tags in our business casual, filling out forms and doing “ice-breakers” while listening to the overly peppy and ever smiling speaker prattle on about our “mission.” We spent a lot of time talking about coping mechanisms and what to do if you ever think about quitting the PeaceCorps. I guess the whole point is to just get everyone together in the same room in order to meet for the first time, and you might as well talk about something, so not quitting the PeaceCorps is as good a subject as any. Not to mention, I'm sure they designed the whole thing so that if you loose your nerve at the last minute, its in Philadelphia instead of in the middle of a very expensive plane ride half way around the world.

After the day of meetings I ended up skipping on going to the bars on my last night in America. I know I missed out on some socializing but first off I was really tired after the night before, and second I hadn’t seen anyone smoking so I figured all the other volunteers where squares anyways (this was odd because as it turned out more people in the group smoke that don't). The next day in JFK during a rain delay I was pleasantly surprised by everyone’s enthusiasm to waste every dime of our per diam in the airport bars (a sign of things to come). At some point just before we landed in Brussels we where informed that we would not be able to make the connecting flight and would be spending the night in Brussels, courtesy of the PeaceCorps.

In Brussels, serendipity visited me, as it often does when it comes to drinking beer. As I left my room in the hotel to check my e-mail in the lobby I ran into a group that was ready to head out into the center of town. The group included my roommate, Carlos, not only a fellow Michigander, but a fellow Spartan, Martin from South Carolina, and Joe from San Francisco. Granted, according to some of the other volunteers we where not supposed to leave the hotel, but hell, I have never been one to follow arbitrary rules. When I was invited out it didn't matter that I was completely unprepared for a night on the town, there was no way I was getting left behind to hear the stories the morning after. We missed a connection with someone that Martin knew from studying abroad, but ended up in the middle of some medieval castle drinking incredible beer which wasn't so bad. We didn't have much of a plan but luckily we ran into a nice Lebanese guy named Nicholas who guided us to a bar with over 150 beers on tap, and ended the night three bars later with some sort of flaming absinth shots and having to drag Carlos away from a Belgian girl he had only just met but was in the middle of professing his undying love for. Nicholas gave us a ride back to the hotel, the five of us packed into his tiny hatchback, speeding down the empty streets of Brussels and screaming out the lyrics to “Where is my Mind?” by the Pixies. It was a good thing we got a ride because we only had 5 hours before we where supposed to be at the airport again, and the trains had stopped running hours ago.

I woke up to Mark and Martin, (Martin from the night before) banging on the door of Carlos and my hotel room and then bursting in and yelling at us like drill sergeants until we had packed everything and where out the door. Apparently we where already 45 minutes late getting up, and had to get directly on a shuttle to the airport without breakfast. It was a great start to a day that would end with my stepping foot in Africa for the first time.