On Saturday May 3rd, I blew my hair out, put on eye liner, and delivered a
speech in Tigrinia at the US Embassy. On Sunday May 4th I rolled into my site covered
in dust, hair in a braid, and a sleepless night behind me. Being a Peace Corps
volunteer means your life continues to swing and shift between extremes:
emotions, environments, and lifestyles. Within two days I had swung so much I
felt dizzy.
I was picked to give the Tiginria speech at the Embassy during our official
swear-in as volunteers while two of other volunteers gave speeches in Amharic
and Afan Oromo. It looks like I'm starting to accumulate mileage in the speech
making department! It was a thrill and an honor, and I was happy to make my
teachers proud. After a speech from different Embassy officials, including the
Ambassador herself, we were sworn in as official volunteers. We were no longer
trainees and we had all earned the acronym PCV. I would be lying, though, if I
did not admit that the best part of swear-in was the sushi, kebabs, cake, and
diet Coke the Embassy provided after.
The next day we were all out of bed by 4AM in order to catch our planes or
busses to our new sites. We all seemed a little dazed. At that point I do not
think that any of us had internalized what was happening next: we were saying
goodbye to each other, and hello to our new sites with all of the privileges,
responsibilities, and hardships that comes with it.
By the time I got to site I was covered in dust, exhausted, but thrilled to
see my neighbor again. I got my keys from my liaison, put my stuff down, and
then recruited his help in finding a mattress. After winding through a
neighborhood of closely packed streets and houses, we arrived at what looked
like a hardware shop. We then entered the compound behind the stores and went
into a room filled with foam mattresses. I picked one out, trucked it home, and
then went back out in search of the plastic woven mats that people use on the
floor under chairs or mattresses.
When I walked down the road that afternoon, rug tucked under my arm, I got
stares, looks, shouts of "ferenji," essentially everything that makes
you feel foreign and separate. But as I walked past one of the restaurants in
town I heard "Betty!" I turned and saw a group of people that I had
met in the health office the first time I went to site a month ago. They
shouted "welcome back!" I said my hellos and moved on. Some kids on
the road close to my house tried to play soccer with me. A group of women and I
exchanged greetings. Finally I made it to my compound, where my neighbor
greeted me with warmth and a smile.
The swings and shifts of feeling like a foreigner to a resident will
continue through the whole two years of my service. However after today I am glad
to know that feeling at home in this place may not be so far out of reach.
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