It's That Time Again

I am leaving for Ethiopia in 16 Days! I am not sure what happened to the summer, which I know isn't over just yet, but has seemed to fly by! Anyway, I thought I would take this time to reintroduce my blog (back by popular demand) and let all of you know what's going on. It hasn't really sunk in yet that I have a big upcoming trip, so I am hoping this blog will make it all seem a bit more "real".

On August 19th I will depart from NYC to Addis Ababa, the capital of Ethiopia. I've never been to Africa before, and am both really excited and really nervous! I will be interning with CARE, an organization that I've admired since my Emory days (CARE's headquarters are based in ATL). I am going to be working on an urban adolescent health program, doing project design for a program that will be focusing on sexual health, including family planning and HIV/AIDS. For now that's all I really know about my work, I am sure I will have lots more to say soon.

The next few weeks look to be crazy, so this is as good a time as ever to give a shout out to some awesome friends who have made this a truly awesome summer. For the 1st time since 2006 I got to live in the same city and so many of my great Emory friends and I loved (almost) every minute of it. While my liver will surely need detoxing, and its been disheartening to realize so clearly that I can no longer sustain my 21 year old lifestyle, its really been a great summer! The biggest news probably is that I've welcomed meat back into my life, and even though I think my friends joined mostly to watch my stomach explode (it didn't) it was a major milestone.

Paul arrives here on Friday, which of course makes me smile. Some updates about that (NOT what you are thinking) will get their own deserved blog post too.

Also of note, Darcy has generously offered to ghost write my blogs, so while I haven't taken her up on her offer just yet, if you notice a vast improvement in my writing and grammar, it was not a lobotomy!

It's my 2nd to last day of my summer internship here at JSI, so I must go back to work. More to tell real soon!