Difficult Decisions

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www.justgiving.com/zahratalakshi

I decided to turn down the placement I was offered by VSO in Cameroon. It was a difficult decision because I am really excited about going and I'm delighted to have been offered the opportunity to go, but I don't want to end up taking a place for the wrong reasons.

Cameroon looks like a beautiful country - it's called mini africa because of the range of savannahs, deserts, moutains etc - and I would love to be there, but the placements in the north of the country (where mine was) are amongst the most rural VSO provides. There would be no electricty and the nearest town with internet access would be about 60 miles away on very poor roads. I think I could live without electricty for 6 months, but 2 years is a very long time, and my mum was worried about how I'd be able to keep in touch. I know that the job I'd be doing would have lots of frustrations as well as lots of joy and positive learnings but I will find it easier to settle in if I can keep in touch with my family and friends fairly easily.

So I've said no to that one but will hopefully get a couple more offers within the next fortnight. There are also exciting developments at my brother's business in China so going bacjk there for a couple of years is still definitely on the radar 😊

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