I have landed safe and sound in Delaware! My flight was pretty uneventful and I had a really nice apple crumble! The weather is nowhere near as bad as I was thinking, apart from the odd pile of snow here and there, there is little evidence of the big freeze. The whole team came to meet me at the airport in Philadelphia so that was a little overwhelming but really nice. I asked them promptly if they had a kettle in the house to which one of them replied, (this was a genuine question) ‘what’s a kettle?’ That seriously worried me. None of them drink ANY hot drinks. That also worries me. So I am thanking myself for bringing tea and I bought some coffee at the store today. We have a water cooler that also dispenses boiling water so I will be just fine. You can all stop worrying!
My first 24 hours have been somewhat eventful and I have thrown myself in with both feet. I’m almost unpacked and living with 5 people. I’m actually sharing a room with one of the other female interns, which for those of you who know me well, you will know that this will challenge me! We live right above the youth centre which feels a little alien but I think I will grow to really like it. This morning, I attended my first team meeting which was really exciting as things are about to step up a gear. We are going to figure out how I will fit into that on Wednesday. After the meeting, we went ‘grocery’ shopping and then had my first experience of a drop in at the centre. There were quite a few kids here and I played ligretto for the first time and one of the young people made me switch cards with her because I kept winning and she thought they must be lucky! Halfway through that, I left with some of the guys to experience my first taste of their juvenile justice ministry which takes place in a prison not too far from us. At first I was a little overwhelmed and felt out of my depth but after the talk we had all planned about drugs and alcohol, we broke into groups and played a card game called Spades which I had never played before. On the first hand, I ‘wheeled’ it which meant I won all the tricks! Ha. After rubbing that in, I had some good chats with the guys and am hoping to go back there. We finished up just after 7pm and then headed to Wendy’s for tea and two of the guys filled an ENTIRE tray with a variety of burgers. Welcome to America!
This weekend, we are going on a retreat with some of the young people to a Church in Pennsylvania which means by the end of this week, I will have been in three states. We are so close to so many places and the guys said they’d like to go to Washington D.C. as they haven’t been there yet. I’m excited about that! After all this time of waiting and wanting to be here, it still feels very strange. When you’re working, especially doing something that you love and have a lot of experience of, you could really be doing it anywhere. I guess the difference is that I stand out a lot but it helps that I’m comfortable being me. I think it will take a little bit to sink in that I am living here and doing this! I think this time is going to be really exciting and I want to see how we can all work together as a team to reach more kids after what has been a bit of a crazy time for this centre. The leader here is SO passionate and so honest, it’s really refreshing to be around that again. Tomorrow, I am having a day off to get myself together and have a bit of me time. I am sat on the sofa now watching TLC programs on Netflix so not much is different!!
I will update as often as I can!
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