Round 3

This round has been great so far! I have about three weeks left here, then a week back on campus before graduation! My new team has been wonderful and I've also made a bunch of new friends as well!  I'm pretty close with a few of my new teammates, one being my new sister/partner in crime!  She and I, together, made friends with some people on another AmeriCorps team that are staying in the same hotel as us!  I, also, on my own, made friends with a bunch of students from South Korea who are visiting for a few months.

We are currently in Atlanta, Georgia, but have been and will probably continue to do a lot of traveling!  We started out working in a warehouse helping prepare for any disaster that might come.  Right after being trained on what to do when a disaster hit, Hurricane Joaquin started to grow.  We went to Fort Bragg, North Carolina and helped receive trucks full of supplies for the disaster.  Once that was taken care of, we started to head back.  We made it to Florence before having to stop, that was the day the major flooding hit.  A dam broke 15 minutes from where we were staying.  There was a county-wide curfew in place, so we bunkered down and waited out the storm.  The next day, we had to go through Columbia in order to get back to Atlanta.  There, we got to see firsthand just how bad the flooding was.




Once back in Atlanta, we began supporting the JFOs and DRCs that were being set up for the disaster.  JFOs and DRCs are Joint Field Offices and Disaster Recovery Centers, basically headquarters for the disaster for FEMA
. 


In Fort Bragg, we were able to stay in my hometown of Fayetteville.  It was wonderful to see my hometown, but also very hard.  We were working 15 hour days, counting driving time it was 16 hours.  We were spending all of that time in the cold rain with little to no shelter.  It was like being home, but not able to touch it.  The positive though, was being able to see one of my closest and longest friends.  I am hoping that if we go back, which we are expecting, that maybe we won't work as long of hours and I will be able to see my old home and some more family friends and old friends.  Another cool side was that growing up, I lived outside of Fort Bragg and was only able to go in every once in a while as a civilian.  Coming

back, not only was I now an adult, but I was working in areas of Fort Bragg that not many people get to see! The photos right above are pictures that were approved that were taken in Fort Bragg!



We've all been given a wonderful chance, thanks to our POC (boss), to do cool jobs and interview employees in FEMA.  I am currently working with FEMA Security learning how to do fingerprints. 


Outside of work, I've been able to enjoy hanging out with my new friends, my new team, playing games, watching movies, going out.  We've also been able to do a few really cool ISPs including Beat the Badge where we helped set up and take down a 5k for Emergency Response.  There I was able to meet and get a picture with a SWAT Team.  I was also able to go to the Netherworld, an amazingly awesome Haunted House!  It was by far one of the coolest things I got to do!

We also got to participate in Trunk or Treat as well! It was my first time dressing up, since we don't normally celebrate Halloween, so I really had a blast!


Besides that, that's about it! I am just now finding this at 04/17/16 and am going to go ahead and post it! When I originally was trying to post this, I couldn't get any of my photos to actually go in...

 Anyways, Hope you guys enjoy this months late! We all graduated and moved on with our lives, doing different things now which I will speak on in my next blog!

And lastly, here are photos from graduation! 

 This one is walking into work for the last time!