So you asked ...

As I prepare for departure, people have asked me some common questions. I figure that other people who may not have spoken with me might have similar questions. In the coming weeks, I will provide more definite (and real) answers to some of the questions. (I ended three straight sentences with "questions." I hope to improve the writing quality on this blog)

What is your itinerary?

Tomorrow morning, I depart for Washington, D.C. We spend the day registering and getting an orientation to the Peace Corps. Then, we leave for Ecuador on Wednesday morning. We spend the first few days in Quito, the capital, getting more orientation before they ship us off to our training villages. In the past, the training villages have been based around Cayambe in the north (I will put a map of Ecuador on the right side so you get a sense of where everything is).

What's the climate like?

Well, from the name, you get the idea that the country is near the Equator. So it's going to be pretty warm. Ecuador is located in northwestern South America and divided into three climate areas — the costa, the sierra, and the oriente.



The costa is the costal area on the Pacific Ocean. It gets very hot and very humid here. The sierra is the Andes Mountains. The altitudes here can get as high as 16,000 feet. There is snow at the top of the mountains. We were to prepare for temperatures in the 40s. Then there is the oriente (rainforest), where is it humid and rains all the time.

Where will you be living after training?

They give us our locations some time during training (I'll let you know as soon as I learn more). They want to meet us first, see our skills, and learn what we can do before they decide on placement.

What are you going to be doing?

Just like my exact placement, I'm not quite sure what my job will entail. I am working in the natural resource management program. It has three primary goals: environmental education, conservation, and business advising. Within these categories, the possibilities are pretty much endless, so I don't really want to speculate on what this will entail.

What will you do during training?

We will spend three months in training. Peace Corps Ecuador employs a community-based training philosophy where you live with a local family and complete training while living in a village. Some of the types of training will probably include: language, cross-culture, soccer, health, laundry, safety, technical, how to maximize limited water pressure, and whistling. This is probably not an exhaustive list.

Will you come home?

I might. Throughout my 27 months, I will accrue 48 days off. One earns two days off for every month of service. While I might have the opportunity to come back to Michigan, I also want to take advantage of this chance to be in South America and see what this continent has to offer. And if someone wants to come visit me in Ecuador, I could use some of my accrued days off to explore with them (hint, hint).

Weren't you Ecuador last summer?

Yes. Last summer I backpacked throughout South America. I started in Quito and, over three months, rode buses all the way to Rio de Janeiro (If you want to read my emails from that experience, they are all on the blog. There is even a picture slideshow.). I spent three weeks in Ecuador. For 10 days, I was in the Galapagos Islands, marveling at that the huge boobies. For the rest of the time, I mostly explored the sierra and made a brief appearance in the oriente. I applied for the Peace Corps before I left for my South America journey, so I think my placement in Ecuador was a coincidence. But some might tell you that there are no coincidences.

What t-shirts are you bringing?

Something you might not know about me is how much pride I take in my t-shirt collection. Not only that, but there is a story behind every t-shirt (Last year, I did an experiment by wearing every t-shirt in my closet. The rule was that I could wear it just once, then I couldn't wear it again until I wore every t-shirt in my closet. It was a great experience, and I even considered blogging about it, but then I got lazy. I didn't have to rewear a shirt until December.)

The packing list told me that I should bring six t-shrits. I briefly considered giving up on this whole Peace Corps thing altogether. Then I regained my composure and starting sifting through the cotton. Then I settled on a few shirts that capture some central themes of my life that are also t-shirts I wouldn't mind losing (something you have to prepare for with anything you take to the Peace Corps). I will bring a Detroit Tigers t-shirt, a Detroit Pistons t-shirt, two Michigan t-shirts (one white and one blue), and a red Moosejaw shirt (more for the comfort and color than anything else).

What movies will you take?

Before I answer this, I decided that a fun icebreaker question would be: Choose 10 movies that you will watch for two years.

Now, I know that I will watch more movies than the ones I am bringing. Bootleg movies are readily available on the streets, and other volunteers will bring some. But to start off, I am bringing Toy Story, The Godfather, Air Force One, The Fugitive, Tommy Boy, Sallah Shabati, You Don't Mess With The Zohan, D2, Miracle, The Sandlot, and Major League. So maybe that's more than ten movies, but I had more sleeves in the CD case.

Will you have internet?

I don't really know yet. Because a good portion of the country doesn't have running water, the odds of me having internet at my house are close to zero. But because Ecuador is a big tourist destination, there are internet cafes in every city and most towns.

I will post a mailing address soon. Mail typically takes about ten days to get to the Peace Corps office from the States. But the best way to reach me would be via email (ian.jacob.robinson@gmail.com). And maybe if you are lucky enough (and I am lucky enough to have a good internet connection), we could gchat...

My new haircut!



So for the last 22 years, I have only sported one hairstyle: the Jew fro. But as I enter a new phase in my life, I thought it was time for a new phase in my hair life, as well.

My friend, Vadim, told me about one of his dad's friends who gives $7 haircuts out of his basement. I went with Vadim, his brother, and his dad on a Sunday afternoon. The guy's basement is unfinished. It is essentially bare concrete except for a barber shop chair, a mirror, and a ping pong table.

I told him to take about half of my hair off. Well, let's just say that the scissors didn't make an appearance until ten minutes into the twelve minute hair cut. My hair is shorter than it has ever been before (I'm pretty sure I came out of the womb with more hair). But I'm pleased and it will give me a good base to grow from if I can't find a barber for a while. The four of us left with the same haircut, and while we waited for the next person, we played ping pong.



If you were interested, I beat Vadim.

I think I have found another use for my time

Tonight, I finished The Sopranos. For the last seven weeks, I have been watching them straight through. Aside from a two-week roadtrip, Tony Soprano has consumed my life, more figuratively than literally but I have lost some weight.



So now that I have finished the Sopranos, I need to find a new way to occupy my time. I came up with a few ideas for this (e.g. learn to play jai lai, develop a discerning palate, overcome my fear of fire), but when I started weighing the positives and negatives of each option, I couldn't quite find ways to fill my time with any of the activities or provide for myself with any of them. So I decided to join the Peace Corps.

On Tuesday morning, I leave for 27 months to Ecuador. The first three months will be spent in training. If I pass, I become a full-fledged volunteer and serve for two years.

I'm not quite sure what my job will entail, but I will be working in a natural resource management program, doing some combination of environmental education, conservation, and business advising. I don't know what this means or where I will be placed, but I hope to learn this during training.

America: Found

So I've been putting off this recap post for a long time. And with the Peace Corps breathing down my neck, I wanted to tie up the loose ends of what I did on the road trip. So here is an abbreviated narrative of what went down.

We left Washington, D.C., ad drove to Richmond. On the way, we stopped at a Wa Wa, which was located on Jefferson Davis Blvd.

In Richmond, we went to the Museum of the Confederacy. The museum tries to convince you that slavery was not the main cause of the Civil War. In fact, there is a display that talks about the role that African Americans played in the Confederate war effort (both slaves and free ones). There is another big display that talks about how the South, when it realized it was losing the war, thought about maybe possible considering the possibility of freeing the slaves to help the war.

Then we drove to Chapel Hill, N.C. to go to the Clemson-UNC basketball game. We tried to meet up with my friend for dinner before the game but his phone died, and while he was driving to the phone store to get a new charger, he was pulled over for running a stop sign. So we had Qdoba and went to the game.

The Dean Smith Center is huge. It seats 20,000, and everybody is wearing Carolina Blue. We sat behind the basket in the upper deck. The guy sitting next to us played college football against a Bo Schembechler-coached Presbyterian team in 1950. It was a close game for a half, then UNC blew them out.

We planned to spend the night at my friend's apartment. He works for Duke. Well, he didn't answer his phone after the game. Long story short. It took two hours, phone calls to his sister, his mom, a guy named Snapper, 23 missed calls, and a guy in Durham brandishing a knife, but we finally contacted my friend and spent the night at his place. At one point, we considered couchsurfing in Kryzyzewskiville, but it was so cold that the tenters were given a grace period.

The next day, we drove to Atlanta. On the way, we passed Dale Earnhardt Blvd. in Kannapolis, N.C. (I just want to race, Daddy). In Atlanta, we stayed with my college roommate. We had a delicious dinner at his house before hitting the town. Highlights from that night included our Siberian waitress at the Irish bar and the Waffle House at Underground (considered by many to be the shadiest Waffle House in Georgia).

The next day we went to downtown Atlanta, looked into visiting the aquarium before deciding it was too expensive, looked into going on the CNN Center tour before deciding it was worthwhile, wandered around the Olympic Park, and went to the World of Coke. This was a good decision, except that the Coca-Cola bear bit off my friend's head. After the Coke Museum, we stopped at the Varsity diner, an Atlanta staple, before hitting the road toward New Orleans.

We stopped at the Tuskegee Airmen National Historic Site in Tuskegee, Alabama. The museum isn't quite open but, because one of the Airmen's trainers was visiting, we were treated to a special tour. Then we hit the road for the Big Easy.

We stayed with one of Marshall's high school friends, who is doing Teach for America in New Orleans. We went out that night, and through a random conversation, I learned that one of my good friends from Michigan was working for Americorps in New Orleans. I saw her the next day.

We pretty much spent the next couple of days exploring New Orleans, walking around the French Quarter, going to different music shows, eating beignets, searching for the king in king cakes, riding the street car, and learning about the hurricane relief effort.

After a weekend in New Orleans, we began our journey northward. Our first stop was at an unsatisfying, all-you-can-eat buffet in Meridian, Mississippi. Then, we got off the freeway in Birmingham, Alabama to drop by Bob Dylan's favorite bar, except that it is closed on Monday mornings. So, we continued to Nashville.

We spent the night taking in the scene on Broadway. We saw a country band, a bluegrass band, and enjoyed pint night at another establishment. Even I enjoyed pint night, because I got a root beer. The next morning we took a tour of the Parthenon. They build a model of the Greek structure in Nashville because some guy coined the town the "Athens of the South." Then we got lost in the Opryland Hotel, which has four different ecosystems in it and everything you could ever think would be in a hotel and more. Afterwards, we said goodbye to Marshall and continued our journey.

Unfortunately, the rain that was falling froze. So driving conditions were far from ideal. While driving on a two-lane highway in southern Indiana, we drove off the road and had to be towed out of the ditch. The guy whose lawn we drove onto had one eye and was carrying a sawed-off shovel. He was only there to help. We spent the night in Paoli, Indiana, which is famous for having a ski hill and is just a few miles from French Lick (hometown of Larry Bird).

We spent the next morning in Paoli, waiting for the roads to clear and enjoying the ambiance at the local diner. A bunch of the people staying at our motel questioned whether we would be able to move our snowed-in Buick LeSabre. Well, let's just say that this "city boy" proved them wrong. We were on our way to Bloomington.

We spent the night there with Danny's friend Danny. The next day we drove back to Ann Arbor for Danny's farewell party. We enjoyed a final meal together at the Northside before heading home.