Who are we? Silver 3!

The night after I wrote my last post we were assigned to our permanent teams. The fact that is was happening was kept secret from the corps members and it was a bit of a shock to have it happen so fast. It was sad to say goodbye to my pod but it's great to know that I have a group of friends beyond my team. I'll get to see them on campus for the next few weeks and then whenever we're all back for transition weeks between projects. Since we lived with our pods for the first few days, getting permanent teams also meant moving rooms. Luckily I only had to move across the hall but lots of people had to go from the 3rd floor of one building to the 3rd floor of the other. Moving day was Friday and since then I've settled in with my new room and roommate/teammate. I'm liking my team so far and have high hopes for our 10 months together.

Since getting our teams training has been a lot more interesting and I feel like we're doing things that are relevant to our upcoming experiences. We had one on life after Americorps options and it gave me some motivation to get working on grad school apps. I don't know if I'll have internet access once we go out on spike (an Ameriword for off-site projects) so I need to get as much done as I can the next few weeks. Other training topics from last week were about Service Learning, Civic Engagement, and Alcohol Awareness. We usually have 4-5 sessions a day so it gets to be a lot of information to take in but I've enjoyed most of it so far. We've been able to have some good team discussions already and I'm looking forward to hearing my teammates' thoughts about other topics. After a long week of training we had most of the weekend off. I'm going to be one of the 15 passenger van drivers so I had a special training for that on Saturday. It was a little intimidating and I definitely still need to work on my parking skills but I think I did pretty well with driving and am glad I can fulfill that role on my team. That training took up about 4 hours on Saturday but the staff member we were with used it as an opportunity to show us Sacramento and point out interesting places and things to do. It gave me a better feel for where things were in relation to each other and made it easier to get around when I went out downtown Saturday night.

Yesterday my dad came from San Francisco where he was working and spent part of the day here. It was great to see him and we were able to explore some places and scope stuff out at our own pace. It was a test of my navigational abilities to get from campus to downtown and then figure out where we were once we got there, I didn't realize how much I really like Sacramento. The neighborhoods all blend together nicely and there's lots of independently owned shops and restaurants sprinkled throughout. It would be a great place to walk or bike to get around and the pace of life seems around my speed. I wish we lived closer to the city itself. Although it's only about a 20 minute drive to downtown and it's possible to get there by public transit it's not the safest to take at night and not many people have cars to drive. One of the team leaders gave a bunch of us a ride Saturday night but we still had to get a taxi for the ride home. I want to take the light rail train sometime soon during the day to figure out how it works and get comfortable with the system for the future.

I'm writing this during a break between morning PT (physical training) and our training for the day. PT has been going well so far. Besides the obvious misery of getting up at 5am to work out the exercise itself has been challenging but not too over the top. We were put in running groups based on a baseline test and it's nice to be running with people who keep the same pace I do. I know they'll try to push us to get better over the next few weeks but it should be just the right amount of pushing. It wakes me up to be active in the morning and I've noticed my energy levels have been higher.

Our training today is called Hands of Peace and is all about opening up to our teams and learning to work well together. I've heard good things from teams who have done it already so I'm excited for today. Tomorrow we're heading to Camp Mendecino which is run by the San Franciso Boys and Girls Club. We'll be there until Friday doing some mini service projects and team building activities. There are high/low ropes courses, a zip line, and lots of hiking trails through redwood forests. We'll be sleeping in open air cabins and taking minimal showers, which I'm actually pretty excited about. It should be a great change of pace and a chance to really get to know my team. I won't have cell phone reception so I'll be off the grid until Friday afternoon... until then send smoke signals!

Laura

P.S If you're reading this please comment! Just want to know who's out there...