About 22,000 Miles Traveled

Feb 22, 2010
Ethiopian Airport in Addis Ababa
Cool, Clear
20,995 + Distance from Mumbai to Ethiopia

These last two days have blended together, I didn’t know when Sunday ended and Monday started. Something about never going to sleep really messes up my concept of time. So I’m in Africa now. We left Dariya Mahal at two in the morning, spent another heinous few hours going through security and customs with some heinous officials taking power trips. I saw one security guard playing with his metal detecting wand and his other “wand” to pass the time while a huge line formed.
Last night, Max and Harish prepared a later dinner for us and we sat around talking. Harish spoke of his mother, who died about a year ago. He gave each of the women on the trip a necklace his mother had picked out before she died – mine is a rope of green stones. Hearing him talk about his family and his parents made me really homesick. These have been the most difficult days of the trip for me, between my dog dying and struggling with housing for next year and being sick. The Chinais were really lovely to us, but I’m glad to be leaving India. It was a herculean challenge just to keep cool most of the time.
As we walked through the Mumbai airport to our gate, there was a row of American food: The Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf, KFC, Pizza Hut. I had nine hundred rupees that I couldn’t exchange for Tanzanian money, so I ended up buying some fried chicken and pizza and a huge chocolate bar. I don’t think I’m ready for the trip to be over yet, but I miss the logic and familiarity of the United States.

Mombasa, Kenya
I started to write a journal entry here, but the stewardess told me I had to put my laptop away. We stopped in Kenya to refuel.