Sheraton Iowa City

... this sort of feeling, and many people find it as empowering.

I spent the day today at the Civic Engagement Poster session in Iowa City, trying to network the Bplans project and Red Voluntario research to needy volunteers. From the feeling of things, I think people got pretty excited. Of the 20 people that I was able to talk to, 18 gave me their emails for further information.

Only 6 more days until our flight to RIO DE JANIERO!

Thank you everyone for your support!

A clip written by David Burgess (U.Iowa) for the group at the Civic Engagement Poster Session 9/2/09:

"Red Voluntario ʺVolunteer Networkʺ is collaborating with
BplansForHumanity to be the first University of Iowa semester‐long
study abroad social entrepreneurship initiative that integrates an onthe‐
ground team of students working with virtual teams at the UI
through ...

... while in NY), and we were back on the road.
Des Moines and Iowa City were our primary destinations. Given John’s eight-year residency in Iowa City, he still has many friends living in the state, and I was privileged to meet many of them. Penny and Morgan, a terrific couple, whom I greatly enjoyed getting to know, provided us with accommodations for a couple of days while in Des Moines. They fed us, entertained us and listed to us ramble about our journey to ...

... grew up. We saw the beautiful state park for the area and all the town's highlights, including a lunch at Poopies (a biker bar where all the food is related to poop, ha!) thanks to A. Sharon & U. Allen.

Grandma's birthday is next week, Happy 25th Birthday Grandma, so to celebrate we went to HoHun Mongolian Grill and celebrated in style with Birthday hats, cake, lollie bags and, of course, Mongolian food. This place is ...

... get hair cuts,  we fueled up the truck and got a local company to change the engine oil, using a synthetic and pricey( or as they say over here "spendy") oil. Gotta look after the chevy. So far she has been very good to us!!  
Our RV park although called Sleepy Hollow was right on Interstate 80 but it was surprisingly quiet.
Our RV neighbours were from only a short distance away and were very friendly and we enjoyed talking about Iowa.

  

... this amazing continent.

We are originally from the San Francisco Bay Area. Ken spent 33 years working for a municipal police department and was able to retire on his 50th birthday. Ann has 22 years as a police/fire/911 dispatcher and quit her job on her 42nd birthday. We sold the house, gave everything away and hit the road. It was an easy decision for us but one that most people have a hard time ...

... to meet up with the twins that I nannied for all last year and also see some old friends (for those of you who followed my previous blog I'm sure you will love to see how much the twins have grown!). I will then head to Minsk on Sunday, Sept 23rd and begin work on Monday. I am a LITTLE nervous about how it will go because I have heard that the hospitals are much different from what I am used to... there may not ...

Sergey emailed me today, so I thought I'd quote an excerpt you might find interesting: -------------------------- From: Sergey K- To: Spencer G- Date: Jul 7, 2006 10:03 AM Subject: from RUSSIA!!!! Hey Spence, I finally got down to your diaries and I must tell you one thing - in my 9-year stock of English words I cannot find a single one to describe my positive emotions about your writing!!! Why the heck did not I look at it before? It's COB friday and I have almost wrecked my ...

... that I have the proper voltage converter for my camera battery charger. I have just received a new digital camera (Nikon D70s) for graduating from grad school (yes! it's over!) and will hopefully be taking excessive amounts of photos of my travels to share with you all. Other things I have been purchasing or preparing to pack: 2 Sweaters 4 Longsleeve Shirts 1 Umbrella 4 Pairs of Pants 2 Pairs of ...

... us up from the airport and let us live with them until we find a place of our own. It will be so nice to have a real dutch family as a resource while we are there. We are very blessed for this opportunity and we cannot wait to share all of our experiences with you! We hope you are all doing well! We will miss you very much! Please Keep in touch! Love, Nate & Andrea Green