Airport Bloggin'

1) Oh here we go, here we go, here we go, oh here we go again...

Well, here now at my gate in the Atlanta airport for 3 hours waiting for my flight to Chicago. There was basically no line at security and my gate is so close to security that I can still see where my mom was waving bye to me. My flight schedule is Atl to Chi, Chi to Brussels, Brussels to Bujumbura, Bujumbura to Nairobi. The trip totals a modest 28 hours, 5 hours longer than the trip to Cambodia (which is farther away than Kenya is......? oh well) I'll be picked up in Nairobi at midnight tomorrow by John Pertet, the Kenyan project coordinator (same type of job as Meng in Cambodia) and taken to Lucy Mjili's house. I'll be living with her (and any potential family who she lives with?) until February when I move to the volunteer guesthouse. I've heard such fun awesome things about the guesthouse: that lots of people are in and out of there, that it's easy to make friends, that you generally work together. So, that'll be exciting whenever I get there. Also, Pertet told me that my school is about 300 meters away from where I'll be living! (not sure if he's talking about Lucy's house or the guesthouse) That's a really fantastic thing because (like Maura in India) I hope that the kids will feel comfortable coming over to the guesthouse to hang out and coming over for dinner and inviting us to dinner at their homes. In Cambodia, teaching was the main goal of my being there. In Kenya, I think it's going to be a lot more about the students and my relationships with them. In Cambodia, the kids were too poor to take time off from working to hang out and their English was so poor that (except for few exceptions) communication would be severely limited. In Kenya, though, I'll be teaching at a private school (meaning they have more money), which at first I was bummed about, but in second thought that means that the kids will have more free time!
Cambodia was so organized that I knew what I was doing every hour of every day from the MOMENT I arrived. In Kenya, I'm just gonna roll with the punches and figure it out: find an internet cafe, visit my school, meet other volunteers if there are any, find a good restaurant, buy groceries, and make a routine. I've done it once, I can do it again.
Apart from excitement and nerves about my trip, this morning has been shockingly awful for many people I know. I wish it didn't take something horrible happening for me to realize how precious life is. Each day could be your last, or could be your last with someone...so love your loved ones, and make sure that they know that you love them. I guess that's all I have to say about that.
I have over an hour more before my flight for Chicago, and once I arrive there I have a 4 hour layover (woo.) There should be some killer weather there! Talk to you all again soon.

PS – Still thinking of you. You're incredible.


2) HAH you call THAT snow?!

Well, just arrived in Chicago...I haven't gone crazy with the camera taking pictures except on the plane looking outside the window. It was literally white...everywhere! The flight was uneventful...slept, had some OJ, took pictures of snow, and studied Swahili...........which is very difficult. Atlanta snow has nothing on Chicago snow.


3) Broke sweat running in the Brussels airport

Flight out of Chicago to Brussels was around an hour late, which, in turn, made my arrival into Belgium late. So late, in fact, that my flight to Bujumbura and Nairobi had already left. So, after lots of running, stairs, and moving sidewalks, I've rescheduled the flight. Instead of leaving Brussels to Bujumbura at 10:40, I am now leaving Brussels to London at 1, then from London to Nairobi at 7pm to arrive in Nairobi at 6:30am. I've been running around with an American guy I met in the security line who was in the same boat as I, and earlier the two of us linked up with a group of 4 American women who were also trying to get to Africa. So, my second red eye flight in 24 hours...lol yay time changes. This whole situation merely echoes my motto of this trip: Go With The Flow.