I’ve just landed at San Francisco International after a great flight, I was almost first off the plane and managed to get right at the front of the immigration queue. I was then surprised by an extremely warm greeting from the immigration officer, all my previous experience of entering the US has always been a little scary. One time in Florida we were actually told that the officers had been sent to Disney for ‘friendliness training’ (I’m not sure how true this is but it makes for an interesting anecdote). This time however, I was extremely pleased with the way I was welcomed into the USA, I even recieved a short motivational talk from the immigration officer about working really hard so I can become an astronaut one day!

After collecting my bags I was welcomed by Ravi from my sponsor company ‘STC’. He dropped me off at my accommodation, a place called ‘The Rainbow Mansion’, which is an intentional community of driven, international, passionate, and socially conscious people trying to change the world (http://www.rainbowmansion.com). As we arrived at the mansion a big communal dinner was being brought out to the table and I got the chance to hear what everyone was working on. Everyone living here is doing something really cool, with jobs ranging from asteroid mining to working with Virtual Reality, there are even a few people who work at NASA living here.