anotha day anotha dolla

I'm not real sure why I chose that title.

Day 2 in NOLA was awesome... of course.

We started with our orientation meeting, which consisted of us missionaries and the staffers sitting around the table going over schedules, what to expect, rules for the girls, etc. A lot of information, but we have the weekend to read over the stuff they have given us and it'll be good.

I'm SUPER pumped to start the program and get to know these girls.

So after lunch we had the rest of the day free. We just kind of hung out around here for a while... we went to a coffee shop called Rose Nicaud a couple of blocks away. The coffee is great there. It's named after the first woman to sale coffee in New Orleans... she was a slave and she sold coffee and sold her way out of slavery until she got a permanent coffee stand and now this place is named in honor of her. Pretty cool.

SHO.

We had dinner and then we girls went to the Uptown District... St. Charles and Magazine Streets. Very cool little area... lots of shops... pretty retro/artsy.

I liked it a bunch. I would.

We went to this little bakery type place called Sucre (shopsucre.com) ... it's owned by some dude that has been on Food Network and junk. Anyway, we got gelato. Amazing gelato. Super fancy cakes and stuff... two dollar pieces of chocolate. One of those places.

We rode around St. Charles and the houses were ridiculous. Sandra Bullock owns one of them. They were amazingly gorgeous homes.

Did I mention we saw Brad and Angelina and their kindergarten class's home yesterday in the Quarter? Cause we did.

I'm looking forward to doing some shopping on Magazine sometime.

It's been cool to get a feel for the city before the program starts... to kind of know where these girls are coming from. Although I have a feeling most of them are pretty confined to the few blocks where they live... that is what the Assistant Director of the house was saying today. Sho yeah.

Anyway, can I just tell you how excited I am to meet the girls and be doing this program? It is such a cool opportunity for them to learn that there is a different way of life they can choose and to show them that the Lord desires them, you know?

Also, I'm gonna be learning tae kwon doe. So watch out suckaaaaaas.

One of the girls here from Mississippi and I have a freakish amount of stuff in common.

Tomorrow morning I'm going to be helping with the ESL class they do every Saturday. I am really looking forward to that.

aaaaaaaaaaaaaand goodnight.

(P.S.: We get to cook a lot of our own dinners and stuff. Yes!)