140 days

The wait for my trip to Tanzania is half way over. It's close enough now that I need to start actually DOING things to get ready as opposed to just talk and think about what needs to be done.

I'm regularly tracking the costs of the flights. I realize I'm probably not going to see a significant drop in the airfare but I do want to be on alert in case there is a significant increase.

One of the reasons I have been so excited about this trip is the challenge of doing something totally on my own. It appears that a likely first test will be a very short layover in Amsterdam - a place I, of course, have never been. Assuming all goes well with that transfer, I'll arrive the night before I'm scheduled to meet someone in the former Tanzania capital. That means I'll either have to walk around the Dar es Salaam airport for 10 hours while trying not to look suspicious (not even sure that is possible) or trying to find transportation to a hotel.

I'm going to try to go in next Monday for shots and then perhaps begin the slow accumulation of the insane amount of supplies I'll need and start to think about how I'm going to fit it all in two bags.

Lynsi, the fantastic person that has been helping me from Global Volunteers sent me the link to a set of pictures from a previous team. It's certainly enough to make me think these next 140 days will pass by very slowly.

8 Degrees South Latitude

Today I made an official (read monetary) commitment to travel as a volunteer to Tanzania for three weeks next March.

Like a kid that can't wait till the next Christmas on December 28th, I am overly excited about a trip that is over ten months away. Whatever- I'm going to allow myself to be overly excited, I just hope my friends don't get too sick of my yet-to-be-informed jabber. My excitement is all speculative but the chance to make a difference in a place that is so different promises to be a life-changing experience, no hyperbole necessary.

Just as the excitement is very real, so are the nerves. Signing the requisite "tough luck if you die" forms and reading about the multiplicity of venomous snakes is a little unsettling. The concept of making air transfers in Kenya or Ethiopia is as well, but being able to conquer the unknown is what will allow me to grow on the trip. I've always been proud of my independence and pending completion of this world of a task, I'll KNOW the sky is the limit.

I will be working with a group called Global Volunteers who organizes volunteer services all over the world. You should check out their website at www.globalvolunteers.org.

Now I face the litany of challenges leading up to the actual trip. Passport, sure, a visa? I thought those were just for baseball prospects from the Dominican Republic.

I'll keep you updated, hopefully enough to keep you interested and updated without being "all up in yo face" about it....I'll try not to be.