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U.S. Foreign Service Officer headed to Wuhan, China

The mission of a U.S. diplomat in the Foreign Service is to promote peace, support prosperity, and protect American citizens while advancing the interests of the U.S. abroad. The work that diplomats do has an impact on the world as they serve at one of any of the more than 270 embassies, consulates and other diplomatic missions in The Americas, Africa, Europe and Eurasia, East Asia and Pacific, Middle East and North Africa, and South Asia.

The duties of a Consular Officer include to provide emergency and non-emergency services to American citizens and protect our borders through the proper adjudication of visas to foreign nationals and passports to American citizens. We adjudicate immigrant and non-immigrant visas, facilitate adoptions, help evacuate Americans, combat fraud, and fight human trafficking. Consular Officers touch people’s lives in important ways, often reassuring families in crisis. They face many situations which require quick thinking under stress and develop and use a wide range of skills, from managing resources and conducting public outreach to assisting Americans in distress.

Indonesian for a day



We got up at around 9am to have breakfast with Yudi (who had already been up since 4am to go to the mosque). Breakfast was a mix of sweet and salty treats with plenty of fruit. There was a fried banana, a coconut yam, sticky rice and hot tea. While we ate, Yudi talked about the religious makeup of Indonesia. He said it was mostly a Muslim country except for Bali which tends toward Hinduism. He warned us that we would hear the call to prayer 5 times during the day starting at 4:30am. The call to prayer consisted of 5 minutes of a man urging other men to come to the mosque. This was transmitted by loudspeakers in the minarets. You could hear the call to prayer all over town from the many mosques.


After breakfast, we took off on motorcycles with Harry and Hendri for the excursion of the day - to visit the floating village nearby. The ride through the countryside was beautiful and took about an hour. We eventually arrived at the floating village which was created when a giant dam was built a few years earlier. We took a little motor-powered canoe out and saw the floating village which is exactly what it sounds: a small city in the middle of a lake held up by large plastic drums. We were able to stop off at one part and walk around. Many of the floating villagers use their small partitions to grow fish (for eating and ornamental fish for pets). ($33 floating village excursion)


After riding back in the canoe and taking the motorcycle back into town we had lunch and then decided to get massages at the local place that Yudi recommended. Sean tried out the hot stones massage, I did a traditional Indonesian one with oils and got a pedicure. It was a lot of fun and super cheap though the language barrier was a bit of a challenge. During my pedicure, the girl asked me a bunch of questions to which I just answered 'yes' and ended up with purple and glitter polish with tiny silver stars painted on and a cup of really strong ginger tea. ($39 food and lodging, $23 massage and pedicure)


We had to wait awhile for the heavy afternoon rains to stop before we could head home for dinner and enjoyed a delicious meal feeling very relaxed. After dinner we met with Hendri's younger sister who wanted to meet us and practice her English. She was adorable and said she especially enjoyed reading English books but that they were hard to find and expensive to buy in Indonesia (so far she had only read two: The Kite Runner and The Alchemist). Sean decided to finish his book that night so he could leave it for her the next day.


We had originally only planned to stay at the home stay for one day but there was so much to see and do and we were having such a good time that we decided to stay another day. (Total for two people = $95


Read More 1 Comment | Posted by Sarah Sanderson edit post

1 Comment

  1. Erica on February 1, 2011 at 2:11 PM

    And the pictures of your beautiful toes are where?

     


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    Sarah Sanderson
    I am currently in Mandarin language training as a new diplomat in the U.S. Foreign Service. Sean and I depart for Wuhan, China in November 2019 for my first tour in consular affairs.
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