Our new home - Nassau

Big news!  Muriel and I found out where we are going in our first post and it was quite a surprise to be placed in the Nassau, the capital of the Bahamas.  Wow!  Island living here we come. 

To get there, allow me explain the process a bit.  My class of Foreign Service officers got a spreadsheet list of posts that were available to our group.  We then bucketed them in to high, medium and low and submitted that spreadsheet several weeks ago. '

Flag Day goodness

After submission of our post preferences and in a highly energized ceremony called "flag day", our postings were told to the class as a group along with a couple of hundred of our closest family and friends.  This happened yesterday afternoon and it was a special atmosphere for sure.  To my knowledge this is the only time we will learn of our future postings in a group, and one that has become very close over the last 5 weeks.  Also our family was there to support us, which made it great.  There is some palpable tension in the ceremony, which goes by surprisingly fast, since these postings determine up to the next 3 years of officers’ and their families, lives. 

When it was time for the Bahamas flag to be announced, I honestly did not expect to hear my name.  I ranked the Nassau consular post as a medium in our bid list, with the thought that I would love to live there but that our latest and past travel adventures would steer us farther afield.  My general thought about the several Caribbean posts boiled down to them being cool experiences but ones that other people would enjoy.   And enjoy very, very well.

Instead, it was announced like this – ‘And of course Wilson Korol is going to Nassau, the Bahamas.’  Wow, I was pretty stunned.  The ‘Of course' didn’t make sense until much later when one of my buddies pointed out that there is a ton of coral in the Bahamas.  Which I will greatly enjoy exploring by the way.

So now what?

I am slated to get to Nassau around the first of September.  My summer is devoted to trainings here in DC.  Mu and I are expecting tons of visitors, you should make Nassau your Caribbean vacation sometime over the next two years as I can assure you we will be living very well and would love to host. 

I did not know tons of about the country until yesterday and will spend a lot of time getting onboard with its unique history, the special relationship it has to the U.S., and the culture.  My initial online forays into this late last night were really encouraging.  Also, while Mu and I have wandered freely around this great world we have never traveled together in the Caribbean and she has never even been to that part of the world.  So there is much exploring to be done regionally.

Lastly, one of our priorities in life is clearly outdoor sports and adventure.  While there are not ski mountains in the Bahamas there are miles of beaches and tons of water sports for us to try out or refine.  That is really really exciting.  I am hoping we get a little sailboat, for example.  And re-try diving.  Maybe fall in love with kite surfing.  You get the drill; the main idea on this component of life is that there are several things we already love on the islands (a bit of climbing, biking, trails for hiking and backpacking) and many sports for which we can develop a love. 

Here are some cool pics and links that have me VERY excited about the next two years.

- Outdoor adventure

- Pictures

- A sampling of life

- Embassy website

In sum, the next 2+ years of our life are decided and that is an enormous relief.  We feel very fortunate to have landing in our situation and start our Foreign Service adventure with Nassau.  See you there!