Peace Corps Togo Letter 1 - Staging Washington D.C.

Salut tout le monde -

This is my first letter for my Peace Corps experience. If you wish to be removed from this list, just let me know.

As most of you probably gathered, I have just embarked on my Peace Corps adventure. For the last few weeks I have been busily packing my bags and generally preparing for two years in Togo, West Africa. My parents have been a really big help in the preparation process, so I want to send a BIG THANK YOU to them!
Because I was coming from Oregon, I got to arrive a day early for the staging event along with eight "early arrivals" coming for the Togo training (mostly people from west of the Mississippi). We didn't know who the others were, but in Dallas, Texas (where I had my stop over) I met two other girls going to the Peace Corps just randomly in the airport (we definitely have a certain look to us - the Chacos (sports sandals that have kind of a z strap for those of you who haven't seen them) are a big give away!). Upon arrival in D.C. some friends from Oregon who had just moved to D.C. kindly picked me up. We had a really nice time catching up and also got to know two other girls who were also headed to Togo. Our training started in the afternoon on Wednesday, so I got the morning to explore D.C. a bit with my Oregon friends.
It was very exciting to finally meet all my fellow trainees. We are a group of 35 - 15 CHAP (Community Health expansion and AIDS Prevention) and 20 SED (Small Enterprise Development) volunteers. The CHAP volunteers are- surprise, surprise - all women. There are 6 male SED volunteers. Apparently our training group gender ratio is a bit less balanced than usual (the story of about everything I have done post high school) and in Togo about 40 % of the PCVs are men. The other groups of volunteers in Togo work on Natural Resource Management and Girls education; the new trainees for those two groups come in September.
I have been really impressed by all the other volunteers thus far. We have bonded really well in just the two days we have know each other. It is a pretty diverse group despite the fact that we are a majority women. The average age of PCVs in Togo is 26, which I would say is probably pretty accurate for our training group as well. We have one married couple volunteering together. Just for some ideas about the group -there are two other half Europeans and half Americans (a half Swiss and another half Brit), a women from Nigeria who just became a U.S. national last year, a number of software engineers (there is a special IT group within the SED volunteers), a number of people who worked in big business as well a biologists, economists, public health specialists, and artists. There is one other Oregonian and a pretty good representation of people from states throughout all the regions of the U.S. (we even have people from Montana, Kentucky, Oklahoma and Arkansas). As far as French level, I think I am probably one of the more comfortable in French. I would say about half the volunteers have a fairly limited knowledge of French, if any at all. I am one of only two people who have been to Francophone Africa before, so I have been telling them a lot of stories from Senegal and I hope they are somewhat relevant to Togo.
On an interesting Oregon connection note - the Country Desk Officer for Togo is from Oregon, one of the leaders of the staging had lived in Corvallis and the Peace Corps Medical officer in Togo is from Portland! I guess Oregonians get around!
The staging itself has included a lot of logistics and safety lectures as well as some fun and games. I had the opportunity to show off my zouking skills (dance from the French Antilles), which the group seemed pretty impressed with. They are much better than my Senegalese dancing skills anyway ;)

Tomorrow we get shipped off to the clinic to get our vaccinations and malaria medication at 7 am (!) and then head to the airport in the afternoon for our 10:30 pm flight to Paris (we have to leave so early because of rush hour on a Friday night in D.C. - none of us are looking forward to 7 hours in the Dulles airport). We arrive in Togo Saturday evening, have a three day "retreat" in Lome and then head to villages outside of Kpalime for our Pre-Service Training. I should have Internet access in Kpalime so will up date you more when I get there.

Hope this letter finds you all well!

A bientot,
Helen

PS - As some of you may know I had some major problems getting medical clearance from the Peace Corps (not because of major medical problems, just bureaucracy) and was relieved to hear that almost everyone had pretty similar problems.