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.

Evening program "Noite em casa"

Every night we put on an elaborate evening program after dinner. Two people are responsible for the idea, the planning and the implementation but everyone is present to help supervise. Programs have been events like putting on a Carnival in Rio, playing traditional games from Portugal, staging a game show, geo-caching in the Amazon and simulating a triple border crossing with exchange rates between Paraguay, Argentina and Brazil. It's an extraordinary amount of work but always interesting to see what the other counselors come up with.

Tonight, however, we all breathed a sigh of relief because it was universally decided upon that our evening program would be "Noite em Casa" which means that there is not evening program and that the time is spent having a "Girls' night" or "Guys night" in our cabins. The campers get to decide what they want to do and the girl campers in my cabin decided on chocolate fondue, nail painting and bracelet making. It was a huge success and also fairly relaxing in comparison with the normal routine.

View of our cabins on the lake on the way back from the bathroom

I don't know how to make any kind of artistic craft, but the girls in my cabin are more than skilled - they even brought their own supplies from home. I learned how to make a cool lanyard/bracelet type thing that glows in the dark! I also found out that they all bring plastic string that glows in the dark to camp so they can keep working on projects secretly, after lights out. Tricky.

There also happened to be a fabulous sunset tonight - never get tired of those here. Boa noite!

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Wanderlust

In Mandarin: 旅遊癮 (lǚyóu yǐn)

According to my Mandarin teacher, the term 'wanderlust' can best be translated as 'a travel addiction or craving'. In the above translation, 'yǐn' has several meanings such as 'a strong impulse', 'a longing', or 'a desire'.

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

Evening program "Noite em casa"

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