PCT to PCV

Well, we did it! We were officially sworn in as Peace Corps Volunteers this morning. A year and half after we started the Peace Corps process, we are finally able to call ourselves Peace Corps Volunteers. The ceremony took place at the ambassador's house and was followed by lots of fried foods, beverages and a chocolate cake with the Peace Corps logo on it.
Now we have a quick break before we are off to shopping for our site. We need to buy all of our buckets and basins (to store water in), pots and pans, dishes, etc... This evening we will enjoy another nice dinner at our country director's house.
We will be headed off to our site tomorrow morning with a vehicle full of our stuff and another friend, Danny, who will be somewhat close to us. Just imagine a jeep with 3 mattresses, 3 bikes, all the luggage we came with, large quantities of food and us! I'll try to take a picture. Speaking of pictures, sorry for the delay. It takes forever to upload them. Our profile picture is of us on top of a mountain near the college we stayed at in Dedza. There are also a couple more on Facebook if you have an account.
We are sad to say good-bye to all of our new Peace Corps friends, but anxious to get to our site and be settled in. We have been living out of suitcases since we moved out of our house in September. I have to admit that I am a little bit nervous for the heat though. I believe it has started raining in Salima since we went for our visit so that should at least provide some temporary relief.
Also, we have made our Christmas plans. We are going north to our friend, Angela's, in Nkhotakota. There are 10 or so of us who will be there. It should be fun as she is really close to the lake and a pottery place I want to check out. After Christmas we will go further north to Nkata Bay and possibly to Mzuzu (3rd largest city) for New Year's. Technically we are not supposed to leave our sites except for a monthly restock visit for the first 3 months. Peace Corps stresses this so that volunteers integrated themselves into their communities. However, since Christmas and New Year's falls in our first three months they make an exception.
Well, that is about all! Keep the news coming. We love to hear from everyone at home.