First Few Days

So I've been in country for a few days now, and have settled in enough that I can take some time to write a bit.

So, to start, we left Newark Airport at about 9 PM, and arrived in Belfast around 8 AM local time (3 AM EDT), which was nice, since it meant we were about an hour early. We pretty much breezed through customs, one of the agents seemed to be taking longer and we thought he was grilling people, but they said he was just being really friendly and offering advice on places to go and the like. Even better, all of our luggage made it with us so Andy's black-cloud of travel seems to have dispersed.

After that we split into two cars, well, one car and one minibus, went to our various apartments/houses to unload/rest for a few hours. Then Doug picked us back up for lunch at his house, after which we went and walked around Stormont, the North Irish Parliament Building.

Yesterday we started going around to the various sites, starting with mine, where we all met David (the minister), John, the manager of The Base is incredibly nice, and though I was warned his accent was incredibly thick, I didn't have too much trouble with it. That might, however be purely because he was trying to slow down and "speak like an American," in which case, I'm in trouble. Regardless, both of them seem fantastic, and I think I'll have a great time working there.

We then came back to Andy and my apartment for lunch, and went back out for a few more sites in the afternoon. The highlight of the day, however, was when Andy managed to blow out all the lights in our apartment by touching the shade of his overhead light. We didn't have the proper fuse to replace it, so we survived off natural light and lamps, with two carefully positioned flashlights allowing for showers this morning.

Today, we went around to a few more sites, and then we climbed up Scrabo Hill and Scrabo Tower (from which we could see Scotland!) It was quite scenic, pictures will be up on facebook soon, but I don't have the energy to deal with that tonight. Tomorrow we have a few more sites to visit, followed by dinner at Doug's. I have a schedule for the rest of our orientation time, but right now I'm just focusing on getting picked up in the morning and staying with the group. The past few days have been intense, but I think I'm beginning to settle. For instance I'm able to remember that I'll be picked up at 10:30 for church on Sunday, and Wednesday is our first day at our sites.