ET

ET= early termination

Yes, ladies and gentlemen we have officially quit and are now in the U.S. I must admit thus far the whole experience seems pretty surreal... Anyway, there was only so much I could take in terms of being extremely unhealthy. Right before we left, in addition to the kidney stones, I also accrued malaria (again) and then giardia (intestinal parasite). So we were supposed to leave earlier, but the medical office decided it would not be best for me to leave with three different things going on--- not to mention the fact that I was on like 6-7 different meds, which ended up equaling about 15-20 pills per day. It felt like I was a 90 year old trying to hold onto life, when hello---- I am 24.

It took the two of us several months to reach the quitting-conclusion, but I definitely said that if I ever got 'very sick' again that I was going to quit--- and like magic one week later, exactly 2 days before we were supposed to go on vacation with some friends to Ghana, the kidney stones arrived. Let me just say.... kidney stones are probably the most painful thing I have ever encountered--- so basically hope it never happens to you. Funny thing is, the PC medical officers told me that Malian water was most likely the cause of the problem. (the water having many more minerals, and it being impossible to stay adequately hydrated here = malian kidney stones)

So where do we go from here? Who knows? I sure as hell don't. I have some vague 'plans', but nothing really deserving of being called a plan. Right now I am going to try to let me body get back to normal, eventually I'll get a job I suppose, maybe move to CA (lots of family there)... all I know right now is that quitting was the right decision. And as Tim said, sometimes it is more difficult to quit than it is to stay. I would say that I have to agree. It's not like all of my 'plans' thus far have actually been plans anyway. There is this quote in The Dark Tower book 7 (not that I read it, but I live vicariously through Tim sometimes) that says something to the effect of 'people who end up exactly where they thought they would be, end up shooting their faces off.' I never thought I would leave any university with three degrees (it's kind of obnoxious actually); I never thought I would be legally married at 22; I never thought I would actually live in Africa or join the Peace Corps; I never thought I would quit and end up where I am now (Byron, GA).... but I am okay with it all--- or rather I am happy with everything. C'est la vie.

No regrets.

Michele and I have left Africa.

Sometimes knowing when to bow out and say 'I don't think I should be doing this anymore' is the harder decision to make, but sad as our departure was, I believe it was the right decision.

Yesterday afternoon I stepped back onto American soil for the first time in over 10 months. As I emerged from the airport here in my hometown of Fort Walton Beach, I had been either on a plane or lounging in an airport for over 24 hours. It is done and both I and Michele are home again (each with our respective families for the moment - Michele in Georgia and I in Florida).

No regrets. At least no regrets for the things I have done. Mali was an adventure and it was fun. How many Americans will ever get to say that they lived in Africa for a year? Not many. Now that my experience is over, I have to say that each and every moment was worth it. The only aspects that I do regret were a few things I wish I had had time to do: mainly visit the mosque in Djenne (a big deal for an architecture nerd like myself) and travel up to Gao and Timbuktu to see the Sahara.

I'm not 100% sure of what comes next. I'll use this first month back as a transition period to get used to America and try to become healthy again. The margarita I have long been looking forward to will have to wait a bit longer. The medicine I am taking for my exposure to tuberculosis means I am not allowed alcohol for a long time. Maybe several months. Michele and I have to remain on malaria medication since we both might still have some malaria incubating in our systems for another month. And in two weeks we get to start taking the 'kill everything in your system' WMD of medication to wipe out the djiardia and other parasites we picked up while abroad. Oh, and I've still got that case of run-to-the-bathroom-once-an-hour diarhea that popped up on the flight between Paris and Atlanta (10 hours). But hey, no reason to get down about anything! I now live in a house with a toilet rather than the open hole outside that I'm so used to.

So from here on out I'll be posting about all of my best memories of Mali and the goings-on there and every once in a while put up some info about any potential future plans. Here's a fun list of some of my fondest moments:

7 - the number of chickens that I myself have prepared for cooking - slitting throats, plucking feathers, and disemboweling (watch out for those intestine, wow do they stink). I seriously progressed in my ability to prepare the chicken from that first nightmare episode (I let go of the chicken too soon after slitting its throat and it got up and ran around attempting somersaults, apparently not dead like I had thought). Granted, while my ability to put a chicken down peacefully improved greatly, my ability to catch the chicken was still a bit rusty at the end. I guess you could say my average for chasing and catching a chicken was somewhere around 10-15 minutes, sometimes even up to 20 min. And they all usually came to a point where I start to throw rocks and solicite the dog or neighboring 6 year olds for help.