A Plethora of Lists

Things I am most Excited and/or Nervous About that will Probably Obsolete in Four Days (Hopefully because they aren't issues, not because I have bigger issues :D )

-The other students I'm going with: I have been blessed/cursed with a school and major full of people who are somewhat like-minded. I think I'm more nervous about how I will handle the culture shock of being with new Americans than how I will handle the culture shock of being in Africa :)
-The first pangs of homesickness
-Getting know Arusha
-Something happening at home that I can't be here for
-The fact that I can't carry Elham, Ailish, Seble, Fran, John, and all my other professors, friends, and family in my pocket, even though I know I wouldn't really want that
-Having to eventually leave
-First impressions
-Nervous that I will be with a group of people who want to "save African children." Sorry if that is brutal...
-Being the "girl who talks too much" in my classes
-Learning to be without a car and perpetual internet availability for the 3,000 times a day when I wonder about things and want to look them up online
-Not knowing lots of stuff (which of course is actually a good thing)


Wild Fantasies That Have Very Little Basis in Reality

-One starlit night I go to a club with my friends to dance. A jam breaks out, the best dancer in the room grabs me, and we wow everyone to tears with our powerful yet sophisticated moves. Later, he invites me to learn all sorts of new dances, become really good at them, and spend all my free time traveling with the dance company I get asked to join.
-My new dance partner wants to devote obscene amounts of time to learning Lindy Hop, but he doesn't have to because he is naturally good at it. So we start teaching free classes, running free dances, and create a Lindy scene that quickly spreads to neighboring countries.
-I buy a bicycle (hopefully this one is plausible)
-I learn more than I could imagine about peace, law, life, and Arusha. I also get to know all sorts of government/nongovernment people that take me as their humble apprentice,teach me their ways, and invite me to stay in Arusha indefinitely. I tell them I would love too, but I must first return to my Goucherian roots and finish my last year of school. I will return immediately after finishing grad school in Stockholm.
-I become a Kiswahili master in a matter of days.
-Although I become best friends with all the people on my program, I also make lots of friends that live in Arusha.
-While climbing to the top of a volcano, it erupts over Arusha causing mass amounts of non-harmful ruckus, but everyone escapes just in time, no one is hurt, and nothing is destroyed.
-I become great friends with a local family that I begin to babysit for because at some point during the past few years my maternal instincts kicked in and I became someone who likes kids.
-My new Tanzanian fiancé invites me to stay for the summer and live with his family, though before I leave we decide we are too young to marry and break it off indefinitely in hopes that we will someday meet again. We stay great friends and visit often via the new environmentally friendly airplanes that are invented while I am there.
-Every weekend I take a bus to the coast where I meet up with my new group of surfer friends and ride the waves late into the night. We build a sailboat.
-I go to the Democratic Republic of Congo.
-I find a wonderful community organization to work with and remember that I'm not going to Tanzania to surf, but to learn. I surf anyway, but maybe a little less.
-The local karaoke bar has thousands of songs in English, although it doesn't matter because I'm fluent in Kiswahili. One night after throwing a few back, I decide to give it a shot. A member of a local band spots me and asks if I will sing with them. In between my classes, surfing, lindy hop, volunteering, and such, I tour with the band.
-I play basketball and soccer on the side and create a Purple Rain sister team.
-I run "The Pilot" with Tanzanian students.
-I am humbled.


Things I have been doing to Pass the Time Before I Leave

-Meticulously highlighting my class schedule
-Talking about how worried I am about malaria pills and roommates, although I'm not worried, just bored
-Stalking my fellow trip-mates on facebook
-Worrying about how privileged I sound in all the fantasies I listed above
-Reading through all my old notes, laughing at the stuff I wrote freshmen year, and wishing I had reread the hundred books that I have forgotten all the information from
-Seeing far too many movies
-Wondering what all the friends that are back at Goucher are doing at any given moment
-Staying up until three in the morning for no good reason, sleeping until noon, eating unhealthily, and generally letting myself go
-Thinking up ridiculous fantasies
-Making lists of those fantasies
-Worrying that someone will take the lists seriously and think I'm a total idiot :D