It’s an interesting feeling being on three different continents in two weeks.  Besides the unbelievable amount of daily exhaustion that arises with me every morning and lays me to rest each night, it’s been an amazing (although I might chose a different word) that I would describe these past couple weeks.  I left my home, went back home and am hours away from flying to my new home. 

It all feels a bit surreal for a lack of a better word.  I feel like I should be flying back to Namposella, seeing my friends and family I have there and continuing this journey in West Africa.  The fact that I have packed four bathing suits should be a clear sign I am definitely not going back to landlocked Mali, but still, my brain has not caught up to the motions of my arms packing my bags for a completely new place.

I truly can’t believe I am doing this again.  I think I secretly thought when I was on the plane home from Africa that the next flight out wouldn’t be for a while.  Yet here I am, checking in for my flight, trying to get a hold of the last of the friends and family, preparing to jump on another across the Earth flight. 

I think what I find most difficult about this entire do-over is that in Mali I already felt overwhelmed with how many people back home I missed.   It wasn’t just a couple people, but it was amazing to me just how many people I stayed in touch with and thought about on a regular basis.  Now, I leave to go to Vanuatu with an entire new family of Peace Corps Mali that I add to my list of people to think about.  Who originally were the ones that coaxed me through my homesickness are now a part of the people that I will now miss.

I’m off to pack the last of my bag—nothing like packing for 2 years in 2 hours.  

As I sit in the Accra airport, there is quite a lot going on in my head. Besides a aching head from a cold I picked up when consolidated with 190 volunteers, there has been little time left to contemplate everything until now. And as I sit here, about to jet set to the United States, it makes me realize how much my life has changed in the past 9 days. A mere week and a half ago, I was in Koutiala, Mali getting ready to return back to my site to continue on my 27 month journey in Mali. Now, I am visiting the U.S for a very short time before heading back out into the Peace Corps world. Only this time, instead of the dry saharan arid land of Mali, it will be the island nation of Vanuatu, filled with a color I haven't seen in plenty for a while—green.

I wish I could say I was as excited as my family is to visit me now. It's just at this point, even as I am in another African country, I miss Mali. I miss the kindness I have never seen in another culture as I have in Namposella. I miss the ease of conversation—that whenever things turned quiet, you could always make fun of a last name and revive the chat. As great as Ghana was, it was the first time it made me truly appreciate the language barrier that existed in Mali. Being able to converse with a Ghanian was rewarding, but being able to converse with a Malian in Bambara? There is no greater lingual reward. I will miss the conversation, I will miss the jokes, I will miss the people, I will miss Mali. In six short months, it has taught me a kindness and generosity that runs deep beyond the amount of money or food you have to share.

To Mali—may peace return quickly and to the next chapter—Vanuatu, please continue your political stability.