RPCV

On August 31st I officially became an RPCV (Returned Peace Corps Volunteer). They punched the holes in my PC ID to make it official. I had a great last few weeks as a volunteer. I was asked to help with train the new volunteers that arrived this past July. They are an impressive group and I’m lucky to have had the chance to meet them all. On top of training, during the two weeks of helping with PST (Pre-Service Training) in Assomada I celebrated my birthday (third in Cape Verde), visited my host family, had a chance to see off a few of the volunteers from my group, and finally made it back to Taraffal (twice).

Afterwards I had an amazing two weeks back in Sao Vicente. I was able to get away for a bit to hike with Rachel and Dominika, my rocks during this past year. I had dinners and lunches with friends. I finished packing and managed to not forget anything important (knock on wood). I went to the big international music fest on my island, and had an opportunity to say goodbye to most of the people that I had met and cared about over the past two years. I feel like I was able to leave feeling like I had reached at least some level of closure.

And now I’m sitting here getting ready for my next adventure. I’m going to take advantage of a once in a lifetime opportunity and spend the next few months traveling with Dacia and Leah, two fellow volunteers. I think saying that we are going to have an adventure may be an understatement. After the past two years we all agreed that trying to carefully plan our trip would be impossible, so instead we are going with a very open and extremely flexible plan. After all TIA – This is Africa. Of course we are trying to take all necessary precautions and then some and we aren’t going in totally blind but we are hoping to do a good amount of networking to have the security of the PC community as we travel.

Our first leg of the trip starts tomorrow in Senegal! We are going to stay with a volunteer in Dakar and depending on the latest news we are heading either north or south. We originally hoped to make our way south to Guinea Bissau (also a former Portuguese colony with a similar Creole), but due to fighting at the border, we may have to change our plans. If we can’t make it to GB we may try instead to head north to St. Louis, followed by a westward detour (by train!) into Mali to head to Dogon county. If time and money allows, we’d all love to get to Ghana, but that may be pushing it.

After a month or so in West Africa we are heading east. Most flights from Senegal head to either Uganda or Kenya. Because of recent events in Uganda and Kenya, we may try to look into fly directly into Tanzania. From there we will try to head to Mozambique and then end our trip in South Africa. Of course this is all dependent on health, time, and money, but as of now this is the general plan. I don’t know if I’ll have much internet, but I’ll try to at least post when we arrive and leave each country. We are hoping to travel until Christmas so there may not be anything too exciting until then.

Best wishes! - Linds