Saturday, September 22, 2012

Kiss me at your own risk, I'm Irish


I might be the oldest person ever to get mono.  Yes, the kissing disease.  I wish I had a good story to share with you about how I got mono, but, alas, I do not.  My life here, in that regard, is not so interesting.  I had suggested mono as a possible culprit to my Rundu doctor, but he said he doubted that was the issue and never tested me for it.   I’m still on the mend and likely will be for some time, but at least I know I’ll get back to normal eventually. 

My day-to-day experiences are significantly limited now due to the fact that I spend most of my days in bed or sitting like a bag of potatoes in my office chair.  The result is that I don’t have much to share.  Blog posts won't be absent, but they will likely be less frequent until I recover, which could be a few weeks to a month or more.  The sickness hasn’t been all bad though.  It’s given me a lot of time to read and think and consider my approach to volunteering and life in general.  The Youth Center and Peace Corps are both being great about giving me time to recover.  It’s been a very long time since I’ve felt so little pressure and I’ve been trying to make the most of it. 

I do have a little bit of news.   On September 10th, I became an Irish citizen.  My paternal grandparents were born there, which made me eligible to claim citizenship.  I researched it and found no downside to pursuing it (no risk at all to my American citizenship) and the up side is that I can now live and work in any of the European Union countries.  It was a long process that I chipped away at slowly over the course of about 3 years.  One week before I left for Namibia, I submitted the final paperwork to the Irish Consulate in New York City.  Last week, a letter arrived at my address in the states congratulating me on becoming an Irish citizen.  I’ve always been proud of my Irish heritage and it’s a nice feeling to officially be part of the club. 
 
That’s it for now folks.  Take care and thanks for reading. 

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