long time no post

Yes, I know I haven't posted in awhile... a long while.

Here's the 411 on me: This past Fall, I was continuing to work for Nuru and also go to school half-time. Right before Christmas, I was siting in completely stopped traffic-- I mean car turned off and everything-- and read through my work emails on my Blackberry. As I read through our regular operational emails from our beloved CEO, Jake, I read that my team's rotation schedule is to change from June-December, to June 2010-April 2011. Although I LOVE living in Kenya, and I'd be so happy to live there for 9 months, it left me with the decision to either leave Nuru or FOREVER forsake my Master's degree in Counseling.

You see, the Accreditation for the Counseling Program has a rule that one must finish their degree within 5 years. I applied and was accepted in the Summer of 2007, before leaving for Sudan for a year. Then, when I returned and began my degree in the Fall 0f 2008, and then deferred it again to work for Nuru, I still planned to eventually finish my degree. The issue with the 5 year thing is that I'd have to re-take the GRE and re-apply to the Program, and re-take all of my previously taken classes once the 5 year mark was up.

So... I officially ended employment with Nuru at the end of the year. Jake understood, and so did the rest of the Nuru Staff. This Spring, I'm taking 16 credit hours, and volunteering for Nuru still. I'm planning to stay in contact with most of the colleges involved with Nuru, continue updating the @bh2o on Twitter, and do other tasks so that Nuru will still have an awesome Be Hope To Her (BH2O+) event. (http://www.nuruinternational.org/takeaction/bh2o.html).

The good side to all of this is that I now have time to make new friends, get rooted in my community here in Morgantown, and join the leadership of the 17three college ministry. Its so weird to think that I don't know the next time I'm going back to Kenya, or Africa in general. I've been spending this month thinking about what that means, and how that re-defines who I am. It probably sounds weird to some of you, but I've been "the girl who goes to Africa" for almost 3 yrs. Now I'm what? The girl who acts awkwardly around large crowds of people, and knows people, but at the same time, knows nobody at all.

Now that I have more time in life, I'm going to continually blog about my experiences in Morgantown and the Counseling Program. As of late, I have an average of 3 books a day coming to my doorstep, if that gives you a hint as to my reading load. Most of it pertains to Addictions Counseling. Not much is more awkward than reading about Alcoholism in Starbucks-- besides if maybe I read it in a bar, which, would defeat the purpose of trying to stay awake while reading.

Well, here's to a happy new year to all of you! Keep reading, I'll try to make it interesting with the awkward anecdotes that is my life!