Watch the Walk

My sister and I successfully surprised our parents with bringing her and baby Joseph for a visit before I leave. There's lots to the story, but I'll tell it in brief. Hehe. The setup: I told my parents that I needed to catch up with a friend after a meeting on Wednesday night. "You know how things go with Kami... it'll probably be late," I said. I did go catch up with Kami. I picked up a carseat from her, visited for a little while, then headed for the airport at 10:30 PM. Arriving at the airport about 1 AM, I met my sister and nephew, situated them in the car, and proceeded to drive through incredibly dense fog all the way home. Joseph alternated between sleeping (post-feeding) and wailing (any time he was returned to the carseat while awake). It was during one of those stops that I posted this status update :  We arrived home at 5:15 AM, and Joseph was asleep. So we parked, brought things inside, and situated R and J in the boys' room upstairs. Papa heard us...

Aside from the physical tasks related to getting ready for Africa, there's also the mental/spir'tual side of things. And a big part of this is being ready for culture shock. Culture shock : the emotional, psychological, and physical impact of learning to live in a new culture, that threatens unconscious assumptions and challenges a person's ability to flex to a new way of life.  The following is a list of various "symptoms" of culture shock. Take note though, it's not an exhaustive list: - Homesickness - Boredom - Withdrawal (excessive reading, excessive use of electronics, only wanting time with other Westerners) - Excessive sleep - Excessive eating - Irritability - Exaggerated cleanliness - Relational tension - Chauvinism - Stereotyping nationals - Hostility toward nationals - Loss of ability to work well - Unexplained weeping - Psychosomatic illnesses As you can see, it tends to manifest itself in various forms. From personal experience, I tend to withdraw,...

It's been barely a week since I transitioned from support raising to full-on Africa preparation. Hard to believe really; it seems more like a month. I've been busy finishing things up with work, making sure that things are ready to transition to a new person. I've also done a lot of sorting. There are clothes to get rid of, things to donate, items to store more efficiently. Everything is examined by these two criteria:      1) Is it something worth taking with me?      2) Is it worth storing for 2.5 years? If the answer is no to both of those, the final question is: discard, or donate? Fortunately, this process has been simplified by the fact that I've gotten rid of a lot of things with each transition back and forth between college, home, and Central America. Sorting as you go certainly helps when it's time to pack your life into a couple bags. So what do I still have to do? -- Sort some more. Still things to go through and deal with. -- Buy some...