Rice Patties and Oranges

March 6, 2013. Today was the day!! After not sleeping at all last night because of the pain in my entire body from the sun as well as nerves, we met at the training center and received our sites! After 2 months, we finally know where we can call home for the next 2 years of our lives :D I cannot even begin to explain the mix of emotions I have right now (terror and beyond excitement are the two main ones) so I'll just explain what I know about my community.
It's called Villa Altagracia and it's just about 45 minutes outside of Santo Domingo, right off of the thruway. It's surrounded by rice patties and orange fields (yay! Orange juice!). I will be on the right side of the thruway but there's a town on the other side as well. This also means that I'll have 2 schools to work in right away (:D). They built the other because they didn't want to kids to have to cross the dangerous road to go to school. The population is about 7,400 and I will be living with a Don and a Doña (first time with a Don!). Apparently they are renovating their house right now? But Ann said it should be ready by tomorrow when I get there lol. Electricity will not be available more often than it will be available, and for whatever reason, Ann said specifically to me, "Bring your water filter!" Haha. Though I will be working with those two schools initially, I will eventually be teaming up with The American Chamber of Commerce in the DR (AMCHAM-the acronym, I think) and could potentially be in up to 9 schools (:D). But that's more down the road. I'm only 10 kilometers away from an amazing couple, Greg and Lula and I couldn't be happier about that. I saw them a bit after and just said, "Guys, I just love you so much and I'm so pumped you're near me. But I hope you feel the same since we'll be working together!" Lol.
Tomorrow, I will meet my project partners (one of the school directors and the president of the PTA-equivalent organization) at the training center, listen to a few talks in Spanish, have lunch, and head out! I have to lug everything I own there tomorrow so they can help me get my stuff to my site (that main street in the morning is gonna be brutal with 2 rolling suitcases and a book bag that probably weighs more than me in manuals and books lol). Then I'll be at my site until Sunday! Crazy!
This will probably be one of the last few blogs I can post for a long time. I'll share my first adventure in site when I get back to the capital next week but after that? I'm not sure I'll have internet at all in the next 3 months. So! I'll be back at least one more time. Graduation. PC Prom with a Shipwrecked theme (totally gonna be a pirate :D), a day of rest, and then I'm on my own surrounded by wonderful Dominicans, oranges, and rice (and maybe even mountains?)! Love you all. I can't believe you joined me on this crazy journey that was training. But for those of you who did? Thank you. My goal is to get Internet when I move out on my own but we'll see. Hasta entonces, adios y nos vemos pronto. And baby? Happy 2 Years. We rock.