Two Weeks

by Dom on September 13th, 2006

So with exactly two weeks left until I leave the country, it’s raining here in Augusta. It’s a pleasant, welcome rain though. However I do still have a few things to do though the laziness of the rain is contagious.

A few of the things I still have or would like to do include getting my immunizations transfered to a Yellow Card. Apparently this is the way to go in terms of traveling with immunization records. I also need to return-ship a bunk camera battery. It doesn’t take a charge, it’s strange. I would also like to go look for a knife. A pocket knife, that is, to bring with me.

Packing List and Sundries

by Dom on September 9th, 2006

So this is the packing list I’ve made up. The stuff in bold are things I still need to get. I have already done a test run of packing once. Everything fit and I could carry it all. Man, was it tight though. I think I’m going to try to cut back on some clothes next time around.

The Passport Quandry

by Dom on September 9th, 2006

So some of you may know, some of you may not. I didn’t even know until after TJ and I got back from Texas. Apparently FedEx had lost my Peace Corps passport application. See, I already had a passport but that doesn’t matter when you join the Peace Corps, you have to get a new one. The same in all aspects except that it says that I’m a Peace Corps Volunteer on the back cover and it’s only good for five years instead of ten. There are two options when applying for this passport, you can either apply as a new passport and go to the Post Office for verification and pay $30, or you can apply as a renewal, fill out one form, and mail it with your current passport in a FedEx envelope with the overnight label provided by the Peace Corps. After attempting the first, I went with the second. There is a time frame that they tell you as well. They want you to mail it in within 10 days of accepting an invitation. Well, because I didn’t want any problems, I did just that. As it happened(”as it was suppose to happen”) the day I got back from Texas, over a month and a half later, I found out it was missing.

I recieved an email from the Peace Corps’ country desk saying that the travel agency hadn’t recieved my application yet. Obviously, I became a little uptight and dug out the tracking number from my files. According to tracking it never left Atlanta. Great. This was on a Wednesday night. I called FedEx and let them know. Someone from less-of-a-phone-booth-more-of-a-warehouse called me back almost immediately requesting a description, which I happily gave. I then proceeded to call every business day until two days ago, the seventh. On that day I finally broke down and mailed in a new application and a form explaining that I’ve lost my passport. As it went I had to mail it through FedEx the second time as well, because all of the Peace Corps regular mail is heat treated for anthrax. For some reason UPS was never brought up.

I have tracked that package and I know that it was delivered yesterday. I included a not, per a lady at the travel agencies request, explaining my situation and requestion expedition. So now with two business weeks until my departure day, all I can do is hope. No ones discussed what happens if the passport application doesn’t go through in time, so we’ll just have to see. I’ve been told a tale of one of these passport’s not being recieved by the Peace Corps for two years since it was sent. As long as it turns up, that’s really all I care about. Though I feel now that I’ve sent in the form explaining that it is lost, I’m a marked man.

In The Beginning

by Dom on September 8th, 2006

So here I am starting a blog. That’s weblog for you non-nerdy types. I plan on trying to update this as much as possible, though don’t expect many, if any, pictures. I have no idea how much bandwidth I’ll have there or what my photo editing capabilities will be. Also, I will have an address where I can recieve mail. For the first three months it will be pretty generic then after placement, I’ll have a new address specific to my location. Once I know either of those I will post them. I won’t have internet access for the first three months I’m there. At least I’m pretty sure I read that. So this site will probably be pretty boring for that time. But “I’ll come back, I always come back.”

This is how this is all going to go down, to the best of my understanding anyway. I have a plane ticket leaving on the 25th at 6am (I don’t know what I was thinking) for Philadelphia. I’ll stay there until the 27th when I leave for South Africa. I stay in South Africa for a night and then it’s on to Malawi. I’ll have training for three months. During that time, as I stated above, I won’t have email/internet access. After that I get sworn in as an official volunteer, and shipped off somewhere else in the country for my permanent placement, and thus when my two years begin. I am scheduled to be back to Augusta/US on December 14th, 2008. And that’s that.

I’ve decided to not allow comments for now. This is because of the spam comments I got last time I did this and because I don’t know much interenet access I’ll ever have over there, and I do’nt want to waste my time allowing users to register or whatever.

Here are some other links for you. If you’re bored/interested dig around.
Malawi.com
Malawi Nation - the newspaper
Lonley Planet - Malawi
Wikipedia - Malawi
U.S. Embassy - Malawi
Peace Corps - Malawi
Peace Corps