It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia

I've never been to Philadelphia, and my knowledge of Philadelphia is fairly limited; thinking of Philadelphia mostly brings to mind the Liberty Bell, Independence Hall, and cream cheese. So while I will be in Philadelphia for less than 24 hours for my pre-departure orientation on September 29, I won't need to see much to greatly increase my knowledge of the city. And since my group of volunteers will be checking out of our hotel at 2:30 AM the following morning for a bus ride to NYC and 15-hour trans-Atlantic flight to Johannesburg, I don't think I'll need to worry about losing beauty sleep in Philadelphia. There should be ample opportunity to catch up. (If anyone is wondering, we have no layover, so evidently planes can fly for 15 hours without refueling. Evidently.)
After flying from Johannesburg to Maputo, we will have a three-day orientation where we'll learn basic survival Portuguese, get our immunizations, and receive safety advice. On day three, we will travel to Namaacha and meet the host families we'll stay with throughout the 10 weeks of training. Hopefully we'll learn valuable bits of conversational Portuguese during orientation, because my Portuguese vocabulary currently spans greetings, numbers, colors, major cities, and days of the week. At least I can tell my host family that my favorite day of the week is Thursday, and that I've never been to Moscow. It's a start.

Mozambique Romances Recaptured

Some of my family and friends perusing this newly-christened blog may be under the impression that I have been in Africa during the last year. Some might (understandably) think I am still working in Fargo or that I am still hitting the books at St. Olaf. So to get everyone on the same page (bad pun), here is the scoop: I am leaving for Mozambique at the end of September to teach biology as a Peace Corps volunteer (and yes, I did graduate college).
I applied to the Peace Corps during my senior year of college and was accepted and slated for departure to Portuguese-speaking Africa (effectively Mozambique) in September 2008. Later that summer, the Peace Corps was following-up on my application and learned of a recent death in my family. After 12 months of applications and preparations, I was suddenly deferred due to their "major life event policy". Since I hadn't known this policy existed, it was a bit of a surprise; in short, it was time to get a job.
Thankfully, I found one. For the last 10 months, I worked as a medical writer at a clinical research facility in Fargo, which was a great experience. But when my "major life event" deferment expired, I found I was still itching to volunteer with the Peace Corps and work on my Portuguese. So here I am. Here we are. Hence the blog.
Speaking of the blog itself, in case some folks are curious about the titles of the blog and of this post, they are borrowed from Walt Kelly's Pogo (above, left). His subtle views and voice seemed appropriate, but it's mostly a nod to my dad, who was a Pogo fan and a former Peace Corps volunteer in the Philippines.
So without further ado, here is alycia's will be that was, or highlights and musings from my upcoming 27 months in Mozambique. I hope you like Technicolor-inspired color schemes.