I took the oath

And now I'm a Peace Corps volunteer, no longer a trainee. The ceremony was pleasant and brief. During the swearing in, our country director, Dan, gave a speech in which he quoted President Barack Obama's inaugural address:

On this day, we gather because we have chosen hope over fear, unity of purpose over conflict and discord. On this day, we come to proclaim an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn-out dogmas that for far too long have strangled our politics...What is required of us now is a new era of responsibility -- a recognition, on the part of every American, that we have duties to ourselves, our nation and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character than giving our all to a difficult task.
This is the price and the promise of citizenship.

I was moved by these words and felt proud and also privileged to be able to be someone who can afford the luxury of leaving work and life in the US behind to serve for two years in a place where I can help.

I thought of who I am choosing to be in my life, who I am striving to be. The person I choose to be is responsible, compassionate, patient and flexible. The person I choose to be is love and kindess.

I remembered something I read in Conversations with God by Neale Donald Walsch:

You are goodness and mercy and compassion and understanding. You are peace and joy and light. You are forgiveness and patience, strength and courage, a helper in time of need, a comforter in time of sorrow, a healer in time of injury, a teacher in times of confusion. You are the deepest wisdom and the highest truth; the greatest peace and the grandest love. You are these things. And in moments of your life, you have known yourself as these things. Choose now to know yourself as these things always.

I know that sometimes, during my two years here, I might lose sight of this. I might forget my purpose and wonder what am I doing here? But I will try to remember to remind myself who I am and who I choose to be. I choose hope. I choose love.

Anyway, then we ate rice and sauce and drank mango juice! We thanked Ousmane, our incredible training manager and all of our language and technical trainers who helped us learn how to speak and function in Guinea's educational system. We thanked the current PCVs who helped us through training. Everyone has been wonderful, really.

So tomorrow we will go shopping again for gas stoves and other things for our houses, and if all goes as planned, we will go to our respective regional capitals on Sunday (mine is Labe) and then off to our respective villages on Tuesday or Wednesday.

I should have internet access in Labe as well, so feel free to email or call me in the next few days if you want.

I put more pics on flickr if you want to see them.

Peace.