Whew. What a day. After the circus of getting to San Francisco, the circus of Staging has begun. It has been really interesting and really great to meet my fellow PCV Trainees. We are from all over the US, and from a fairly diverse age range, though the median age is pretty low. There are about 6 married couples in the group, and even a few Minnesotans. I was fairly nervous about meeting everyone; after all, they will be my social circle/family/business network for the next two years, and so I was hoping there would be some people that I could relate to. After some awkward meet and greet, and now some more natural time for discussion, I think everything is going to be fine. When you think about it, we are a pretty self-selected bunch--we obviously are going to have at least a few commonalities.

After we finished our orientation session for the day, based mostly around a general Peace Corps orientation and completion of paperwork, we hit the town for dinner. I ended up at an Ethiopian restaurant with live jazz on Filmore St. The food was great, it was fantastic to sit with three random people from CA, OK and SC and have really excellent conversation. (Kirin & Sally: it reminded me of the food we had at Sally's place that one night a while back. Yummy) Now, however, I am pretty exhausted. We start again tomorrow morning at 8:30, so I'm going to wrap up some business and hit the sack. Wish me luck for more interesting conversation and the start of some real friendships with my fellow Trainees. Until next time, signing off.