Homestay

Well, we're off to homestay. Homestay is a phase where we live with a Malian family for a few months. During the days, we have language classes and we go home for meals and to hang out with the family and learn how they do things. It should be interesting though especially because of the lack of shared language. Hopefully by the end of this thing we will speak the same language though! Also, me and Natalie, as expected are living with different families. Unexpectedly, we will be in the same village though so "Yeah!". Well...gotta go.

Some quick pics

Where we live:


The inside of our mud hut:


The nyegen...I'll let you figure out what goes on in here:

We made it!

We are in Mali now! I'll give you a brief run down of the events.

We arrived in Bamako via Paris late last night. It had to have taken us more than an hour to get our bags out of the tiny little Bamako National Airport. We were warned that the people there are very pushy, but I really didn't find them all that pushy. Anyways, afterwords, we were brought to the training facility. It's a pretty cool place. Me and Natalie have a cute little mud hut with two single beds pushed together and a ceiling fan (yes...that means electricity!) We woke up this morning with no electricity and it got pretty steamy, but it was still nice. Luckily I was so exhausted that it didn't phase me. Anyways, we've spent the whole day in training, and I'm pretty muched pooped. Also, last night there was like a foot long gecko in the bathroom. There are really pretty birds and trees here. It's pretty cool. Well...I better run. Love and miss you all.

Leaving for the Airport

Well...staging is over. We are all waiting for the bus now. Natalie and I are super excited now. I spent some time with some of my new friends last night. Today we woke up early and headed over to the clinic for Yellow Fever shots. I didn't have to get one though because I had one in 2002. Me and Natalie also got our Malaria medicines. I get to take a pill every week that apparently gives me really crazy dreams. Natalie has to take a daily pill which makes her more susceptible to sunburns. Well...off to Mali.

Staging Day 1

After a long 9 days of visiting (4 days at the Mette's, 1 day travel, and 4 days at the Bory's), we finally made our way to Philadelphia for our staging. We have now been introduced to most of the 78 people who we are going to Mali with. It's a pretty busy couple of days. Here's our itinerary:

Day1:

Time	Topic
1:30 - 3:00	Registration
3:00 - 7:00	Welcome and Introductions
	Peace Corps Approach to Development
	Personal Definition of Success
	Safety and Support
	Anxieties and Aspirations
	Nuts and Bolts

Day 2:

Time	Topic
8:30 - 12:00	A Slife of Life: Coping with Unwanted Attention
	Managing Risk
	Policies in Practice
12:00 - 1:30	Lunch
1:30 - 6:00	Change 5 Things
	Crossing Cultures
	Staging Capstone
	Bridge to Pre-Service Training
	Logistics of Departure
	Evaluation and Closing

Day 3:

Time	Topic
7:30 - 12:00	Shots at the clinic
12:00 - 2:00	Check out of hotel
2:00	Go to airport

It was a pretty good first day. We saw how everyone else around us has similar fears about going to Mali. Today has really gotten us excited to go on our adventure.

Also, we discovered a few days ago that we will have frequent internet access while we are are the training facility during the first few months of training. Woohoo! Love you all!