Swearing In

Hear ye, hear ye, no longer am I a twerpy little Trainee, I am officially a Peace Corps Volunteer! 100% Certified American Grade-A Volunteer. Yup, we had our Swearing-In ceremony in Maputo on Tuesday to make it all official and, well, now it's official!

Leaving Namaacha for what was probably the last time in quite a while was a surreal feeling, but we were all so excited to get to Maputo for swearing in that we were (mostly) all smiles. Namaacha, being Namaacha, bid us farewell with the rain and matope (mud) that we have come to know and not love. Additionally, we got stuck in some heavy traffic en route to Maputo and it was raining there as well, which meant that not only were we late for our own swearing-in ceremony but we had to revert to Rain Plan and quickly re-arrange everything to be able to have it in the Ambassador's house instead of outside on the beautiful grounds.

So official!

No matter, we were sworn in just the same. First Carl, the director of Peace Corps in Mozambique, gave a speech and wished us well. Then we had a representative of our group, Richard, give a speech on our behalf (his Portuguese is amazing and his speech was phenomenal. I was kind of glad that he was wearing muddy shoes so that at least SOMETHING wasn't perfect.) Finally, the Ambassador gave a speech and then administered the Oath of Office to us -- the same oath that all government employees take (including the President!).

Speeches! From left to right: Carl (Director of Peace Cops Mozambique), Richard (Moz 19 PCV) and the Ambassador

We performed a song to close the ceremony. I was so excited I forgot the words to my verse.

It was really exciting to be sworn in, but for an additional reason that is special to our group. Moz 19, the biggest group ever to grace the presence of Mozambique (68 volunteers!), got through ten whole weeks of training with ZERO Early Terminations. That is really, really unusual. Most of the time, at least one or two people either don't bother showing up, turn around at the airport, or quit halfway through training. We had a huge group and yet none of us went home -- we are all still going strong. The moment the Ambassador pronounced us volunteers sealed the deal. Its kind of a big deal! Now, I don't want to brag, but also our training manager (and organizational goddess) Claudia told us that we were possibly the best group to come through in some time. Sweet!

"Voltando a vaca fria" (Which means "Getting back on topic" but literally "Returning to the cold cow"), swearing-In was hectic but great. What was not so great was that, because we were late and it was raining and everything was crazy, we had basically zero time to mingle after the ceremony. We had just enough time to grab finger food and a soda and take a group picture before we were shuffled back outside and onto our busses. It was a bummer because I wanted to meet some of the Embassy staff and take pictures with my friends, and there just wasn't time. Our next conference all together is Mid-Service in about a year, so its going to be a while before I see these people again! I did manage to take a few pictures, though, so I am going to stop rambling now and let the photos speak for themselves.

My capulana dress! It came out really well!

This is me with Szasha, the closest volunteer to me in Tete. We are about 20km apart and are going to be seeing a lot of each other. Here we are preparing to be best friends.

This is my favorite picture of the day. These are three of my closest friends here. Sarah on the left, then me, Veronica and Lisa. Sarah and Lisa are both in central so I will see them on and off, but Veronica is in the south and it's going to be a while before I see her again. But that's what telephones are for. I am just going to have to budget a certain amount of money each month for Veronica minutes.

So there you have it. I feel prepared to go to site now. I am armed with Portuguese, teaching methodology, and most importantly, a pretty amazing support network. Now the real adventure begins... the next post you will see will be from TETE! That's right! My HOUSE in TETE! You just WAIT!