Finally Here!

We arrived! After a LONG day of travelling (just to get to Michigan) we finally arrived at our new home on the IICD campus in Dowagiac Michigan! We were picked up at the airport in South Bend Indiana by one of the other volunteers and after meeting some new people and getting a tour of the school, we finally got to unpack and settle into our room. It is a dorm room, with two twin beds that we put together, one desk that we share and some random storage units that make the room a little more interesting. We have sink in our room and share a bathroom with our roommates Lilly and Ana Paula. Our first dinner was AMAZING! They try to grow as much of their own food as possible and the food that they buy is mostly organic, and very healthy. Last night one of the other South Korean women named Jane (theses are all their "American" names) cooked traditional Korean chicken. SO GOOD! Then we hung out and everyone kind of did their own thing. We ended up watching Machete, a very intense movie :). Today we woke up and had breakfast at 8. Anthony, one of the teachers/promotional people made whole wheat pancakes. He is awesome. He is all into healthy eating and exercise and is in charge of making IICD more sustainable. After breakfast everyday, everyone helps clean the whole building for 30 min before breaking out in their own activities. Today our activity was orientation. We got the low-down about what we will doing for these next two months while we work off our scholarship. Basically our goal is just to contribute to the school through various tasks such as promotion, teaching English, working on projects like building a water tank to collect the rain water for the garden, etc. Today we have been working just on learning the ins and outs of the school and of Humana People to People, the organization we do our projects with once we are in our countries. We will be posting some of that later. It has been fun having a day of working now, I love seeing how focused everyone is. There are times where the room was completely silent for large chunks of time while people just work. That and the Pedagogic Principles (which I am posting after this) really remind me of Montessori education. I really invite all of you to get on the IICD website (iicdmichigan.org) and check everything out! There will be more to come soon!

Andra