Staging

I arrived in Washington, D.C. on Monday February 12th, a date that now seems like forever ago. 51 volunteers from around the country gathered to start a process called staging. It began with lots of paperwork and lots of excitement. We spent the next day and a half getting to know each other and getting to know the Peace Corps through group discussion and activities. This included a little bonding time over some great Cuban food and salsa dancing. Then on Wednesday the 14th we all awoke at 2:30 AM! We checked out of the hotel and loaded ourselves and all our luggage onto the bus (some had a lot more than others). We arrived at the airport and by this time we had already heard about the wonderful snow storms that were hitting various parts of the county including D.C. At about 4:30 am they announced that our flight was canceled and would not be leaving that day. We then waited in the airport for another four hours until we could get the buses to take us back to the hotel, which luckily still had our rooms. Peace Corps originally booked our flight six months ago because apparently getting 51 seats on the same flight is a little difficult. So to reschedule was quite a challenge and two flights ended up leaving Saturday morning and one flight on Sunday morning (we got to sleep in until 3 am this time). We spent the rest of the time exploring D.C., doing more training and enjoying the comforts of the US for a few more days.
We flew into San Pedro Sula, which is the second largest city in Honduras, located in the north-west region. We then took a 3.5 hour bus ride to Santa Lucia, a small town about 30 minutes outside of Tegucigalpa (Teguc for short), the capital city. We arrived after dark and exhausted. Luckily my host family mother, Rina, was there to meet me and walk me home.