It's gonna take a lot to drag me away from you...

Just over a week till I leave for Kenya! I still have a million things to do so I decided to tackle one of the more pleasant tasks on my to do list: creating this blog. Although, coming up with a creative name was hard so I gave up (Lauren, sorry I didn't choose Krinda or Venya). I'm told I will have access to the internet the whole time I'm there but I'm not sure how reliable it will be so hopefully this blog will help me keep everyone updated on my activities. I will do my best to update regularly but also not turn this into my livejournal circa 2003 (i.e. minimal dashboard confessional lyrics).

Some background on the trip:

So, I just finished my first year in my master's in public health program at the University of Illinois-Chicago. As part of the program, I'm required to complete a field practicum (internship) for the summer and since I'm concentrating in both environmental health/epidemiology and global health, I decided to conduct mine internationally. The program itself involves six students from all divisions being matched with different NGOs in Kisumu, Kenya and working on a project for two months. My specific project involves an NGO called Sustainable Aid in Africa, International that focuses on different projects including water and sanitation, community development, and health education in schools. I have yet to know what my project will be, which has been a source of frustration over the past couple of weeks but it looks like I'll just have to wait and see. I will also be conducting some independent research for my capstone project while I'm there. 

Kisumu

On May 18th, we'll be flying from Chicago to London and then London to Nairobi. We'll be staying in Nairobi for about two days and doing a little sight seeing. After that, we'll head four hours west by van to the town of Kisumu, where we'll be working/living for the next two months. Kisumu is the third largest city in Kenya and right on Lake Victoria. Wikipedia tells me that I will meet a lot of hippos. It also happens to be the birthplace of President Obama's father (and maybe Barack Obama?!?!? j/k) and I am confident that Grandma Obama and I will become great friends. Interestingly, there are also a lot of Indians in the city (we're everywhere) with two temples in town and lots of Indian restaurants. 

Honestly, I don't have a lot of knowledge on this region and never really expected or dreamed of going to Africa but since this opportunity kind of fell in my lap, I figured, why not take it? I've never done anything like this and this is the farthest/longest I've ever been from home so I'm nervous, scared, happy, and excited. I probably shouldn't admit it, but this is the first thing I thought of when I decided to go:

Followed immediately by this:

That's all I need to know, right??