It’s hard to believe but after all the years of planning, the date is finally here when I am set to embark upon this adventure to Micronesia.  To answer the two questions I have received several times: Am I excited?  Yes, very much so.  Am I nervous?  A little bit, but more anxious than nervous.  I just wanted to take a moment and thank some people who made this trip possible.

    First, thank you to my good friend Alex Froom for introducing me to MAHI and arousing the wanderlust inside of me to have the desire to travel and live on the other side of the world.  Thank you to John Schroer for being willing to work with me and keeping the lines of communication going for all this time; I can’t wait to get started! 

    A big thank you to all of my advisers at Dickinson including Professor Pulcini, Professor Edlin, Professor Staub, Mira Hewlett, Greg Moyer, and of course, Dean Bylander.  Your guidance has been invaluable as I have grown and developed the courage to make this journey.  Also a major thank you to all those who have worked with me in a professional capacity outside of Dickinson including Eric Sapp, Burns Strider, Rachel Johnson, Peter Groff and Eddie LaPorte.  Your mentorship has been instrumental in helping me cultivate the real-world skills I would not have learned outside of the college bubble.

    I also want to thank all of my friends who have supported and encouraged me to make this trip.  A special shout-out to Malik Pickett, John Nieves, Josh Foong, Marleni Milla, Brandon Lee, Eric Verbovszky, Matt Livingston,  Uday Shakour, Christina Mullen, Henry McCorkle, Kristen Pacific, Samem Jabarkhail, John Richards, Alan Lepinsky, Brice Lipman, Gilbert Bonafe, Nick Jones, and Ross Anstaett.  All of you are awesome.  ‘Nuff said.  Also, thank you to Kelly Zwink for helping me so much through my fundraising efforts this summer. 

    Thank you to all those who have contributed to MAHI!  Your gift is going to go a long way in helping us carry out our projects to reinvigorate the education system on Pohnpei!  Shameless plug: if you are interested in contributing to MAHI, check out the “How to Support MAHI” tab – all gifts are tax deductible and every penny goes towards MAHI fulfilling its mission.

    Last but not least, thank you to my family, especially my parents.  Your love and support is amazing.  Without mixing words, I am incredibly blessed.

    I know I missed plenty of people, but I really got to finish packing!  Thank you all again, or as I should say in Pohnpeiian – “Kalahngan” (I have no idea how to pronounce that, but I’m sure I’ll figure it out!) 

    I will post my full contact information, including my address in Pohnpei when I arrive, but for now, I can be reached via e-mail at [email protected] 

Best,
Drew

 
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I can't recall going a week during my time on the Dickinson campus in Carlisle, PA without hearing someone complain about how much it rains.  In fact, during all four years, I only heard one person speak positively towards the rain.  He's from LA and I laughed when he said "I like it here, you actually have weather."  I always took pride for some strange reason that I was planning on going four years in the Carlisle weather without a rain jacket.  I accomplished the feat, though I did give in a little bit and often used an umbrella senior year.

Well, to all those in Carlisle, take a gander at this graph comparing the average precipitation between Carlisle and Pohnpei.  Carlisle is in blue and Pohnpei is red, being one of the wettest places on earth.



...I bought a rain jacket.

 
    I haven’t posted in this blog in some time so that viewers could read the story of how I came up with the crazy idea to go to Micronesia.  In the past few months I have been keeping busy working on fundraising and grant writing efforts for MAHI while working from home for a political consulting firm I interned for last summer.  For those who don’t know, I am set to depart for Pohnpei on September 27.  A journey that would have taken me years to complete a couple of centuries ago will have me arriving in Pohnpei on the 29th, though I will only have lived half of September 28, 2011 as I will be crossing the international date line.  There’s no doubt I will be in a haze for a couple days from a bad case of jet lag, but I’m sure I’ll be up and running after a day or two.

    It is a bit surreal that the date is actually approaching when I will arrive on the other side of the world.  I have had the inkling to go on this adventure for four years now and committed to this experience almost a year ago.  Throughout this time I’ve wondered when it will hit me what I am actually doing.  So far, I haven’t had that one moment when reality smacks me in the face.  I expect the moment to be both exhilarating and terrifying.  Maybe it will be when I step on the plane, perhaps when I feel the scorching Micronesian sun on the tarmac, or maybe after I am truly immersed in a culture totally foreign to my own– who knows.   Having never been outside of the country before, I recognize that this is a rather large leap I am taking.  I feel though that I am prepared for this journey and while yes, it’s a bit scary, I am more excited than anything.  Also, I will have a great mentor in John and the entire MAHI team throughout the experience.

    Over this next week or so I am sure I will be busy with final preparations and constantly heeding warnings from my mother to stay out of the water when I’m there (ever since she watched Shark Week she has been very concerned).  Before I know it though, I will be on a plane headed to the Pacific, and eventually reality will hit home that I have started a brand new, exciting chapter in my life.