hey honey i'm home!

i think by this point we all know who 'honey' is.

and home...is still further away from him than i would like

but I'm two continents closer than a couple days ago 

so i can't really complain :)

it is so weird to be back.

when i first got to america, i was a little irked.

by just america in general.

everyone all stylish and fancy

surfin on their little iPhones

seemingly unaware of the people around them.

it kinda made me wanna gag.

i had just come from a place where the norm is

opposite of any of this fashion, media, technology business 

that us americans let our lives revolve around.

to everyone else, i just left to africa and came back.

but it was so much more than the sentence implies.

i was humbled. changed.

when i say humble, i just mean i actually appreciate all the things i have.

and at the same time, i know I'm perfectly capable of living without 

many of those things.

when i got to africa, i expected the living conditions to be meager.

but i didn't expect it to be like that for everyone, everywhere.

there aren't just a few villages here and there who are bad off.

it's everywhere.

everyone is scraping and desperately striving to just get by.

seeing families of 8 living in little 15 by 15 dirty cement huts,

watching disabled kids just sitting on the same spot of cement all day everyday,

going to the garbage pile to dump our garbage...

and then looking back to see a mob of children digging through it

collecting things like empty water bottles and treating them like gold,

licking the jars of peanut butter clean-

the same kids who live on the same street i was living on.

i didn't expect it to be so discouraging to do humanitarian work.

you just want to help everyone, because they ALL need it.

but its impossible to change the whole country

definitely a testimony that through small things, great things come to pass.

small things eventually turn into the great things

but it takes patience and perseverance.

i learned that I'm not as cool or as good as i thought i was.

not that i thought i was some super awesome person,

but now i just feel like i got put in my place

by these people who have nothing yet are so selfless and giving

although, there are definitely some who are greedy and selfish.

opposition in all things :)

this whole experience really changed me in a lot of ways

and gave me a new perspective

when someone asks me 'how was africa?'

there is no way to answer it.

i can never explain what it is like to live there, 

to just be dropped into the culture and to live like them

be without SO many things i always took for granted

its an experience i can never fully explain to anyone

but its one i wouldn't trade for anything.

so here is to all of you

who donated and helped make this possible

i am seriously SO grateful for ya :)

some of these kids look happy, some of them not so much.

but i promise they were:)

and if you can't tell, the sign says THANK YOU! :)