The Departure

Finally, after much anticipation, and help from mom on the getting ready and packing front, I am off to Tanzania. I am currently blogging from the Amsterdam airport, where I am eating breakfast at a restaurant (alone) and sipping fizzy ice tea (weird). The flight was long but to pass the time I watched movies and worked on my Angry Birds levels, which was pretty exciting. Next to me I had an Angry Bird expert, who informed me he had beaten the whole game in two days. For the first hour he was glancing over at me struggling and kept making little noises until finally he decided, for both our sakes, that he needed to step in and help. True to his word, he was quite the expert. He helped me breeze through about ten levels until we got bored and went back to our various movies and continued the flight feeling accomplished. After my delicious breakfast of a ham and cheese sandwich, I am off to find my next gate and two Americans who I am flying into Kilimanjaro with. It will be really great to arrive already knowing a couple volunteers.

We land in the Kilimanjaro airport and then it's about a thirty minute drive to the volunteer house in Moshi. There are about twenty volunteers who live at the house, though we are not all volunteering in the same place. My placement is with Jipe Moyo Women's Group, which is a women's empowerment group whose members are all HIV or AIDS positive. There are many volunteer roles at this organization, some of which include community education on issues such as family health and women's rights, teaching conversational English, and helping the women with fundraising and advertisement ideas for their businesses. I'm not sure what exactly I'll be doing yet but it all looks good to me!

It's only just starting to get light here, even though it's 8:40. I could never live this far north, too depressing in the winter. I am almost finished by breakfast so will sign off and search for my gate and travel buddies. I am so excited to finally touch down in Africa again, only 11 more hours to go!