¨I can´t believe we´re really doin´ it!¨

So, besides having to wake up at 4:30 AM and having to make a couple of final decisions on which T-shirts I was bringing and which ones I won´t see for a couple of years, the morning of departure started well. I had some problems the night before packing. We were supposed to to bring three big bags of stuff, but I decided only to bring two. This was because I had talked to some Returned Peace Corps Volunteers (RPCV´s) and they said to bring as little as possible. I had to leave some things out, but hopefully that won´t bite me in the ass later. The biggest decision was whether to bring an extra pair of shoes or my baseball glove. I went with the glove because I figure I can always buy a new pair of Nikes, but me and baby brown have been through a lot.

After Saying goodbye to Dad and Kyle, Mom took me to the airport where I flew to DC (Side Note: Jackie Joyner Kersey was on my flight with her husband). Spent Monday in DC meeting the rest of my group. There are 45 of us from all over the US and with a lot of different experiences. It should be a good goup. There are a bunch of people from Texas, Ohio, California, and Wisconsin, but only 1 from Missouri. Damn, no Cardinals fans!

Tuesday we went over expectations, safety, country details and other training exrcises. Everyone was half there and half in Ecuador, so it wasn´t as productive as it could have been, but we still learned a lot. One of the last things we did was to go around and have everybody say a short phrase that summed up how we felt. Mine was the ¨Dumb and Dumber¨ quote that serves as the title of this post. Most of the goup is younger than me (22-25), but I think they still got the reference. after that we grabbed dinner, re-packed, and tried to get some sleep for the long day of travel ahead.

Hasta en Ecuador,

Jay

P.S.- Our group is officially called "Omnibus 97¨ as it is the 97th PC group to go to Ecuador. Now, I wish that I had brought one of my Old 97´s T-shirts. Oh well, I´ll see it in two years.