New places, new policies and new training

Howdy! (If you’re questioning my bizarre salutation, don’t worry, it’s not permanent; I’m simply embracing the western lingo ;) )

So much has happened! I’ll start where I left and go from there.

Two weekends ago I volunteered to help with a St. Patties’ Day Dinner. That’s seriously all I knew going into it, and I was a little leery of what I was signing up for – St. Patties Day doesn’t exactly go hand in hand with volunteering. Drinking, yes. Helping others, no. But once I got there and talked to our POC (point of contact, I wish I remembered her name, she deserves better than my forgetful memory!) I was put at ease. It was a St. Patties’ Day themed dinner to support a church’s charity, the Lazarus Foundation.  They own homes and let people who’ve lost everything stay there while they rebuild their life. It was a charity dinner, everyone was happy to be there and I had a lot of fun. The Irish dancing and dinner they let us eat wasn’t too bad either!

That weekend I also made a trip to San Francisco. It truly is a beautiful city. One of our friends almost didn’t make it – she didn’t get up on time, but it worked out because we pounded on her door (to the dismay of her neighbors) and caught our train and bus in the end. Something we saw on the way really shocked me: a 12-year old boy was sitting blindfolded in the middle of the road, wanting to end his life. My friend approached him (that same friend who almost didn’t make the trip,) saying it wasn’t worth it and that he needed to move. He seemed really scared because it wasn’t difficult to convince him to go home. It was terrifying though – what would’ve happened had he not listened? What would’ve happened had we not been running late and not happened upon him? It’s spooky how things work out. I hope that boy is ok.

Now normally I’d share the pictures I took there, but unfortunately I am not today. Trust me; I’d love to share with everyone. However, there’s a strict no-photo policy here on campus and I’m not about to risk getting my camera wiped clean because someone saw me holding one. Once I get a good computer with good internet access and am not afraid of walking around with my camera I promise I’ll upload so many photos (of Sacramento and San Fran) you’ll never want to see another one again. I took pictures all day. Sadly we didn't make it to the Golden Gate Bridge, but now I have an excuse to go back later on!

After San Fran’s adventure we graduated from our CTI (core training institute) on Monday and then we went through a three day course in basic FEMA training. It was a really basic overview of the organization and its job positions, but I learned a lot because I knew nothing about how FEMA operates (apart from the need of being FEMA flexible.)

All that weekend we traveled southwest through the scenic Rockies (well we actually skirted the southern ones, but they were still wicked awesome) and the desert to arrive at this training base Sunday afternoon. I’m one of 4 drivers on my team so we rotated in 2 hour shifts (an AmeriCorps NCCC rule) and drove no faster than 65mph (when you get passed by semi-trucks, you know you’re driving a government vehicle) the entire way. I always feel incredibly lucky when traveling, and even though I was a bit sleep deprived (well actually a lot, it even triggered a couple of nasty migraines) this time was no different. Beautiful mountains, good laughs with the team, great music and seeing the desert in person for the first time, what more could a person ask for in life?

When we arrived here at the base, everything seemed awesome. Maids to clean the bathroom and make our beds, a pool to swim in, a dining hall (no more cooking dinner!); it was like walking into Neverland. However, thanks to a few of my more immature classmates (nobody from my team,) our freedoms were ripped away before we’d recuperated from our travels enough to enjoy them. There was popcorn throwing, chicken playing with vehicles and dangerous biking had so now we can’t walk anywhere alone, we must be in uniforms all day, curfew is at 9PM instead of 10PM, and we’re not allowed to leave base (unless you have a great excuse and permission from a team leader.) I feel five years old walking around in lines, and it's tough always having to walk with others when we have precious little personal time as it is. And to add on to that, my team’s honeymoon period has ended. There has been snapping, tears, whispers, all the ucky stuff. I knew it would happen, it was inevitable, and I know that it’ll make us stronger but with everything added together, it’s been a long week.

Happily (well unhappily for poor Ian,) I got a mini-vacation this past Thursday. He needed a driver to take him to the dentist, our TL, Jessica, told me to take him and lo-and-behold, I got to sit in a waiting room by myself! It was superb. And then we went to fill his prescription and during the 30 min wait, I got to walk around a K-Mart alone. I was pleasantly surprised to discover that people down here are indeed much warmer to strangers than back home. Plus I picked up some dryer sheets to throw in my boots at night and they now smell wonderful :)

Yesterday was also a good mental health day for all of us. It was a day off and they organized a trip to the Carlsbad Caverns for us (I’m still lamenting not being able to share these photos!) It required a lot of walking (to Christian, Diana and Aleia, we rocked that 75 story hike up!) but it was nonetheless really neat. As Ansel Adams (the first photographer of the cavern) perfectly put it, the caverns are “something that should not exist in relation to human beings. Something as remote as the galaxy, as incomprehensible as a nightmare and beautiful in spite of everything.”

Today we began our job-specific training. I now know a bit more about what I’ll be doing as a public assistance specialist and in the next few days I’ll hopefully become knowledgeble enough to make a good difference in the field. We’re still waiting at the edge of our seats for word on where we’re headed after this. They joke that they’ll tell us once we load up the vans and are ready to pull out which isn’t too funny but they really can’t help not knowing. Our assistance is in demand and they’re having difficulty determining who has the most need. But they’ll have to decide in the next week unless they intend on having trained FEMA workers sitting around inactive so it's getting close!

That’s all for now, I’ll be back when I can!

The end of the beginning

Hello again!

Things sure have been busy here! The past two weeks have been filled with training, team-bonding and more training. They've covered everything from disaster psychology to food planning so that our time serving will go easier. During our free time we're often coordinating our next meal or catching up on sleep since the 5:45AM PT sessions really wear down on us. The PT has been paying off though because our second baseline was yesterday morning and everyone I talked to did much better than the first time. I managed to add 10 push-ups and 15 sit-ups to the 2 min allotted for each exercise and I dropped 1.5 minutes during my run! My new goals are to improve my push-up form and run 1.5 miles in 13:30 (meaning I'd be running a 9 minute mile which I haven't been able to do since before migraines appeared in my life).

I'm officially in my new team: I am a proud member of Green Machine 3!! How they knew my favorite color was green, I don't know, but I'm loving it ;) My teammates are great and I cannot wait to work with them this year. During my last blog, I lamented the loss of my pod-mates. (Oh, how I wasn't the only one! Our campus director even discussed "the curse of the pods" during a community meeting.) But we're still friends and I'm headed to San Francisco with a few of them tomorrow so that'll be a great reunion and I'm confident that we'll always be there for each other, even if we're not literally in the same state.

With the assignment of our new pods, we were also given our official role as FEMA workers. My team is dedicated toward public assistance; we'll be the ones assessing the damage to public buildings and we'll also have a hand in the coordination of temporary public facilities that are set up to keep things running in the interim of the disaster and the completion of buildings. I don't know much more at the moment, but I expect to in the next couple of weeks.

The reason I'll know more soon is because next Friday we are leaving sunny Sacramento (although I'm technically in McClellan) and driving down a city in New Mexico (I've forgotten the name darn it) for our FEMA training. All I know is that there are a lot of rules there: if we don't have both our IDs upon entrance we're sent home, if we take a picture we're kicked out and we were told that if we open the wrong door (ie one marked "authorized personnel only") then we're never seen again...I'm sure that's just a scare tactic, but it's worked because I'll be sticking to the herd while there! It'll take 3 days to get there (I'll be one of the drivers since I passed my driving test) and we'll be there for 10 days. After that, we'll get sent to help somewhere, possibly straight from New Mexico. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that they tell us where our project is before we leave for FEMA training so I'll have an idea of what weather to pack for, but if not I'll just be FEMA flexible :)

Let's see, what else?! Team positions: I've been selected as the PT coordinator of my team so I'll be responsible (along with my comrade, Jessie) for submitting a work-out plan once a week and leading group exercise. I'm excited for it because I have a lot of knowledge from my swimming and rowing past that I'll get to share plus there's the challenge of always being in a new place and needing to be creative with what we have. I also have another team position as an environmental liaison along with my teammate, Mike. We'll need to make conservation plans before we go on projects and we'll set goals for our team that we'll assess after projects to see how environmentally friendly our team is being. Both jobs require a decent amount of organization and paperwork, but I'm up for the challenge!

Funny story time: my room has some very peculiar plumbing. Last Sunday our shower was dripping at a quick rate and when I went to twist the handle more off, more water started pouring out! Two hours later, the problem mysteriously fixed itself. Then last Monday our toilet decided to keep flushing. It probably flushed for 30 minutes straight before it stopped. A repairman showed up a few days later and said it was a whole-building-shut-down fix so, but I think they're waiting until we all leave so it'll be less inconvenient for everyone. Such trouble my bathroom is causing!

I can't think of much more for the time being. This coming Monday is our official induction in to AmeriCorps NCCC which will be really cool. Our time in CTI (core training institute) is over (along with the mandatory name-tag wearing rule) and we'll be moving on to some more training before I can actually get out there and do some good. In the meantime I'm working as hard as I can to learn everything they teach us so that I'll be ready to serve who-knows what in who-knows-where in less than a month!

Until next time!