It's been a long time...

I've been out of this for a while, so I'll get you up to speed. Let's back it up a little...Coming home was fantastic (see prior post). I spent my first week home remembering my old easy life - driving anywhere I wanted to go, taking showers though I'm not REALLY dirty (because I now know what REALLY dirts means), seeing and talking to my friends and fam at will, and eating all the good food this country has to offer. Here's one of me with my girls Amber and Ashauna out on my first weekend home. Such great times!

Then I went to Shanghai and life accelerated a little. Everything is fast in Shanghai - quite the opposite of Burkina. We went sightseeing, hit some good restaurants, caught a great concert.
Me with my brother at the Bund downtown Shanghai. It was freeeezing!
The view from my brother's balcony. Breath taking.
And the view from his bathroom. What 25 things in this picture indicate you're not in Burkina anymore?

And now I'm back for America in April - Phase II.

People keep asking me if I want to go back to Burkina now that I'm home and it wasn't until last night that I truly thought "I need to get back there." I got off the plane from China, took a shower to get ready to meet some friends out and started to worry about what I was going to wear. Reality check - who cares? 2 weeks in and I'm back to worrying about the stuff I hated worrying about before I left. Man, life in Burkina is not easy - it's freakin' hard! But that's why I went there in the first place. Yeah, I gotta get back to the simple life where it's harder to forget the important things in life.

To all my fellow volunteers toughing it out in April in Burkina right now - keep up the good work! I know it's hot, but you're helping to make somebody's life a little better and that's what it's really all about.