As I was driving back from Wild Gecko today, sitting in the seat with my pepper spray in one hand and some 1000 bills in the other (money for the beggars and pepper spray for anyone who gets too close to me) I was thinking how bizarre this is and that I really do need to get out of Africa. I started wondering if I could ever come back here.

Yesterday all my blood tests came back fine, except that my cholesterol is borderline high. I was convinced that they translated it incorrectly (because they have to convert from IU to mg) but now I am not so sure. I am not entirely clear on how my cholesterol can be high, because I don't eat meat and I don' t have a family history, but oh well. My biggest problem is my inabilty to lose weight. Karl seems to think I just haven't tried hard enough. Maybe I haven't. I guess I have to become anorexic to lose weight. Less that 1000 calories a day...Interesting thing is that he was telling me to lower my cholesterol I need to go on a low fat diet - I pretty much do that anyway - but then tells me that the Atkins diet is a good one as is the South Beach Diet. Neither of those is really low fat...I am confused.

You know how sometimes you complain about things and you just want someone to say, yeah, that really sucks. Yeah, most of the time that's what people want to hear. I suppose no one ever talks about what they like about their lives.

I'm trying to get stuff together for the yard sale tomorrow. I don't want to go to this...I don't want to go out tonight. I don't want to do anything.

I didn't get the job in Warsaw. I guess it's for the best. At least that's what everyone keeps saying.

What does home mean?

This week in Environmental Psychology was all about home and that got me thinking...what does home mean?

I moved from the first home I lived in when I was 9 months old across the world (perhaps that's why I do this now?). I lived in my first home in Houston for 4 years then moved to the house that my dad still lives in. But what does home really mean?

Right now, my home is in Ghana. With all it's faults and flaws (doesn't every place have them?) this is my home. I had no say in the structure that I live in, a group of people that didn't know me decided that before I arrived. Mostly for family size. And it's been a good fit. I had no choice in the location (Ghana). That was decided by the powers that be as the place that needed my husband the most.

That said, I actually feel like I am "going home" with our return to Poland. While there were several things about Poland that annoyed me the first time, I feel more like it's home than I would if I were to return to Ghana. There's something to be said for returning to something that you know and (mostly) understand.

I guess, home is just where my family is. While I used to think of Houston as home, I have actually come to the point that I don't think of it that way anymore. I guess the 2 places I feel most at home, no matter where I travel, are military bases and U.S. Embassies. In both of these locations, I feel like I belong.

What does home mean to you?

Happy Easter!

Happy Easter to everyone!

The rainy season is upon us. People in Houston, you have no idea how much you miss the rain until you only have it for four months a year. Now during that four months, it does rain every day, but oh, it's so nice! The weather is cooler, in the 70's, and hopefully power shortages will be a thing of the past.

Counting down our final weeks here. It's hard to move, but I am ready. Pamela, Seth, Toby & I were harrassed (a gang of about 10 boys licked the windows of the car and beat on the windows) by the window washers the other day and that made up my mind to get the heck out of this country. Of course, now I am carrying my pepper spray. The cops were right there at the intersection and did nothing, of course.

Then the next day, we went to Rose's tailor who gave us a too high price. When Rose and I came back to the house, she told me "He's too expensive". I said, yes, I think so too. Then she said "It's because you're white." I was like, I KNOW! and then I just kind of lost it. I'm really tired of being in a place where it's okay to harass me because I'm white...it's okay to WAY overcharge me because I'm white. It would suck to have to live this way your whole life and I feel a lot of sympathy to everyone who have had to endure skin color prejudice. I don't know why it upsets me so much because everywhere I have lived outside the U.S. it's always that I'm foreign, so it's another kind of prejudice.