There she goes...

Hi Everyone,
          I have been singing this song in my head a lot lately, thinking of all of my friends and I who are gallivanting around the world right now (I guess it should go "there they go..."). The thing is I only know the first two lines so it  quickly becomes repetitive, sort of comforting, sort of aggravating.

Anyways,
  I hope everyone is settling into their fall and enjoying life. Tomorrow I leave for Kenya and Tanzania for the fall semester, so I have started this blog so that you can track me (I will also have e-mail access so send me an update about your life when you get a chance!). I am going on a study abroad program through The School for Field Studies. I will be living in a bush camp in southern Kenya at the base of Mt. Kilimanjaro and in Northern Tanzania in a similar bush camp. The bush camps are  fenced in areas with cabins and a dining hall/common building (where the is electricity and internet at night). There are thirty kids, mostly from the states, who are going with me. We will take classes daily about the birds, plants, and animals in the area. We will also be collaborating and doing service work with a community of Maasai people in a village near by. We will go on a few hiking trips (including touring Amboseli National Park) as well as spend the last month participating in directed research projects.

Just to give you a bit of back ground...The program is trying to mitigate the tension between the Maasai people, who have just started farming what was open grass lands, and the animals (giraffes, zebras, eland, wildebeest, elephants...) who use(d) that open grass land as a migration route between two national parks. You can tell there would be conflict if an elephant was trying to migrate through a cornfield (probably for the farmer and the elephant). The program is gathering information that is needed to figure out if the Maasai people can have a sustainable livelihood that does not interfere with this migration route.

So, I am off (if I can get everything in my suitcase...)! Traveling from Raleigh to Newark to London to Nairobi to Northern Tanzania (where I will spend the first half of the semester). It will take at least two days and may be more like two and a half. Ugh. But then I will be there! Hope everyone is well.
Farewell from North Carolina!
Sara