suggestions?

Is anybody out there?

I'm going to be posting more on here because there are a few exciting things happening! First of all, I got an email from Kenya that there is finally going to be an East Coast Daraja fundraiser! Mostly they happen on the west coast, but we got lucky! One of Daraja's greatest supporters (Deborah Santana) will be helping to organize an event out here for December. I'm not sure when or where or how but I will post information as I get it!

Second, I am half way through my first semester at Mount Sinai! Believe it or not, it is already time for me to start thinking about my practicum and thesis preparation. I have TOO MANY ideas and not enough guidance, so I'm looking for anyone who reads my posts and might have a better perspective of what I'm interested. I find that others know me far better than I know myself, so leave me your thoughts! So far this is where my mind is going:

There were a few things that really shocked me and shook me to my core in Kenya

1. the lack of food and (clean) water

2. the lack of medical care/state of the village hospital

3. how damn happy every single child I met was

So obviously that doesn't really mesh into anything coherent. I have found myself doing more and more research on maternal health as well as nutrition - did you know that 15,000 children a day die from malnutrition? I also am taking a class on refugee health and find it fascinating.

So basically I want to supply food and water and medical care to mothers and all the happy children in the world, and also work with refugees. Does that sound like I could make it a thesis?! Also, though I want to go back to Kenya at least to visit, I am also interested in traveling to Thailand and maybe India.... But I can't think of a clever blog name for those places.

Get at me with your ideas! I know I sound like a contestant in a beauty pageant with all this feed the hungry stuff... but what did you expect?!

Not sure where this is going...

For some reason I was just compelled to give this blog an update. Maybe it is because exactly a year ago tomorrow a dog dropped a goat leg at my bedside and gave me the gift of a story that will last a life time... maybe it is because last night I had a dream that Jason told me I couldn't come back to Daraja because I didn't have any money... Whatever the reason, here I am.

A lot has changed in a year. I returned from Kenya, started a graduate program, went back to my old job, left the graduate program, applied to other graduate schools, and left my job again. This spring I was told that my chances of getting into medical school at this point are slim to none. I felt totally lost and wanted nothing more than to be cuddled up with a book on a bench at Daraja. Why had I come home if it wasn't to go back to school? What was I going to do with my life if I couldn't be a doctor?

The past year has entailed more soul searching than I would have liked. I had to really take a look at what it is that makes me happy, and what I want to do right now. I had to give up on planning and start living for the first time in many many years. Everything I have done from 2004 up until a few months ago was to get me to med school. Every decision, every experience was tainted with the thoughts of how it would look on my application.

And here I am, about to start a masters in global public health at Mount Sinai. Maybe you guys saw this coming but I sure as hell did not. The good news is this program will allow me to explore myself and my world in ways I didn't know I cared to. Maybe I'll write my thesis at Daraja, maybe I'll travel around East Africa preaching safe sex and clean water. Hell if I know!

What I do know is this: I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I intended to be.