The Anticipation

... is killing me! I can't believe that in less than 3 weeks Ryan and I will be in Uganda, preparing to spend 2 months sans responsibilities and doing nothing but searching for adventure. I am excited to say the least.

But first, the pesky bar exam. 2 more weeks of boring study and hopefully I will never have to face the NY bar again. Preparing for our trip is getting a bit in the way of studying - or should I say that studying is getting in the way of my trip preparations? But everything is almost ready for us to leave. Lots of you are thinking whoa - Ryan and Jackie are nuts to be disappearing into the unknown for 2 whole months, but I think that is the point. I'm so looking forward to new experiences, meeting new people and figuring out how to overcome the challenges that will inevitably face us - we don't even have everything planned yet!

And when else in my life will I have so much time to drop all obligations and wander around? This is one of the reasons we decided to go to Africa - it's an expensive place to get to and there are so many things to see, so it's a perfect place to go for an extended period of time. And we've been "planning" this for years - we started collecting quarters in our "Africa Jar" 3 years ago when I started law school, saying that for my bar trip Ryan and I would go to Africa. It's so nice when far-fetched thoughts like that come true ... not that the change we collected in the Africa Jar was even close to enough to fund this, but it was a start!

I am so lucky to be able to travel (and completely obsessed with it), and so I love to share my adventures with friends. This time, I've decided to start a blog instead of crowding every one's inbox with emails like I have on past adventures. And this way I can upload pictures and videos and there are links to the charity that we are raising money for, and to a website with more of our pictures. I'll share some information about our fundraising effort later, but we are hoping to raise money to donate to Charity:Water, an organization that builds wells to provide fresh clean water to rural communities throughout the world, and in particular in Africa.

(As a side note: Ryan thinks that my blog is -ahem- "busy." Well, duh. If you have ever met me, it is obvious that I like to clutter. Everything. And usually with lots of color. My room is cluttered, my desk is cluttered, my life is cluttered. I would have it no other way. I like pictures and I like books and pretty colors, thus the design of my blog!)

So for now, it is back to studying for the bar exam and checking things off of our pre-departure list for the trip in the hopes that we don't forget something super important that we will need on our adventure ... like the camera :)

I hope that you will enjoy following our trip via the posts and pictures, and feel free to pass this along to others - particularly to those who would like to donate to our fundraising efforts for charity:water.

xox
Jackie