FrancisCorps Orientation

Greetings from Syracuse!

For the past week and a half, I have been at FrancisCorps Orientation with the 10 other volunteers for this year. 5 of us will be flying to Costa Rica on Sunday 9/4 to begin our ministries there, while 6 are staying here in Syracuse to serve.  Our orientation began with dinner with our families and a commissioning mass last weekend.

FrancisCorps 13 at commissioning mass

On Monday, we started our week-retreat at Alverna Heights retreat center, just outside Syracuse. We enjoyed the beautiful scenery and weather, as well as a relaxing introduction to Franciscan Spirituality, goals and objectives for our year, and many good meals. One of my favorite things about Franciscans so far is their “pre-prandials” ritual. Basically, this is a fancy word for cocktail hour. Before dinner, they sit with their community, a few beers (or glasses of wine...) and socialize. Meals together have been long, slow, relaxed, and very enjoyable - not to mention delicious! 

I played with the settings on my new camera to take pictures of the beautiful property!

We took a hike to the "green lakes"...gorgeous! 

Later in the week, we piled in the vans and drove south to Seaside Heights, NJ (home of The Jersey Shore!)  We stayed at a Franciscan parish there (and a few of us in a nearby motel - complete with a pool and cable!) and enjoyed the weather before the wrath of Hurricane forced us out on Friday.

Our group on the boardwalk!

Excitement about Costa Rica is setting in!

Since then, we’ve had a good bit of down-time. We have done a little bit more orientation (taking personality tests, talking about community building, and enjoying more yummy meals), but have mostly spent time bonding and hanging out in the Syracuse volunteer house. The Syracuse community started work on Monday, so the “Costa Rica Chicas,” as they call us, have had a really relaxing week so far!

So far, orientation has been wonderful. The staff is so dedicated to our group, and our group is meshing really well! I'm looking forward to the relationship between the Syracuse and Costa Rica groups. More soon, I promise!

Home!

For the past two weeks, I have been home in Cherry Hill, recovering from the whirlwind end of JVC and preparing for Costa Rica. I was able to celebrate my birthday with my family, spend time in Boston with many BC friends, celebrate Andrew and Daniela's wedding with my family in New York City, and hang out with some friends from home. All in all it's been a really nice but busy two weeks.  I'm off to Syracuse in the morning where I will be at FrancisCorps Orientation until we fly down to Costa Rica on Setpember 3rd. I imagine I'll have phone access until I leave, but after that, e-mail and skype are the best ways to contact me! Thanks for reading along...please keep me and my new community in your prayers in the next few weeks!

Celebrating with Mego & Jenny

Congrats!!

The Foran Cousins!

Allison & Ryan! Friends since age 5!

Full Circle

On Sunday, my year as a Jesuit Volunteer came to an end. I left Casa Dorothy Kazel early in the morning and flew home from Los Angeles to Philadelphia. It was my 23^rd Birthday, exactly one year after I flew across the country in the opposite direction to begin Orientation in San Jose. It was kind of poetic celebrating the beginning and the end of my JV year on my birthday, don’t you think? It also means that it was emotional. Last summer, I was excited about JVC but was also anxious, alone, and missing BC.  This year, I am excited about my next step, but terribly sad about leaving the friends I’ve made this year.  There’s no anxiety but there’s a lot of love that’s been grown this year.

My last week in LA was full of celebrations. The JVs in LA spent as much time as we could together; almost every night we did something as a group!

We celebrated Emily after she preached for the last time at her church in Hollywood on Sunday.

 We celebrated all the time we've spent together.

We celebrated all the fun things we've done this year.

We celebrated our last papusas. 

We celebrated our last dinner as a house at a Japanese BBQ Restaurant.

We celebrated the things we will miss about LA, like In-N-Out & Yougurtland.

We celebrated all our coworkers over lunch with a gang from Verb.

We celebrated the transitions at Urban Compass.

We celebrated our landlord, Al.

We celebrated my birthday.

We celebrated being FJVs.

One of the exciting things, and also challenges, thaa comes with leaving the LA JV community is that we will now be all over the country doing all sorts of things. My friends will be in LA, Berkley, Lincoln, NYC, D.C., Philly, Detroit, El Paso, Dallas, Nashville, Boston, Minneapolis, and Springfield.  This means there are lots of fun visits in the future, especially while friends are going to be in one place for a while for grad school and new jobs. 

Thank you to everyone who has been part of my JV experience. This year has been filled with so many blessings!