ok. my plane leaves at like 1 pm tomorrow. i'm waiting to get a haircut and then danielle is forcing me to go out (or something like that). i'm all packed, just need to cancel my cell phone tomorrow, withdraw some cash, and pick up a perscription. i didn't manage to finish reading all the books i was supposed to, but i got a lot done. hopefully i can read on the plane and not throw up. i have three flights and will arrive in entebbe, uganda on june 4th (they are like 8 hours ahead of us in time). got [View Full Entry]

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ok. so i started this blog thing... we'll see how much i really use it. i'm leaving monday june 2nd for my trip. i found out today i will be getting to kampala, uganda before the rest of the group, so i have an extra day to do whatever before all the school stuff starts. i guess that's cool, but it kind of pissed me off at first - i don't really understand why i'm getting there early and i have to pay for my own transportation from the airport to the hotel (they said about $40). but it'll be cool [View Full Entry]

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We are at the Airport with Jer and Renee! Mom and Dad are expected to arrive soon. Renee looks so sweet carrying her "big white garmet bag" with the dress. Time to board.... [View Full Entry]

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It has nearly been 10 months since I made the decision to leave the corporate world behind in pursuit of an adventure. And now I find myself 1 day away from departure, sitting in my parent’s house with all of my personal belongs trying to figure out how one packs for an entire year. Over these last several months I have slowly been preparing myself for what is coming next - life as an English teacher in the Chongqing, China. I have been reading as much as possible about life in China, trying to pick up small bits of the Chinese [View Full Entry]

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I arrived at my final destination around nine-thirty in the evening - tired, thirsty, and hot. Over the previous twenty-four hours I had made my way from Minneapolis, to Chicago, through Beijing, and finally into the sweltering third furnace of China: Chongqing. During those three flights and two layovers I sat next to a frightened Somalian on his first flight back to medical school, a boorish young high school student who snored all the way to Beijing, saw the glistening blue and white landscape of the Arctic Ocean, the expansive tundra that is Siberia, the winding rivers through Mongolia, a [View Full Entry]

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Kevin Slowey, my good friend and one of the newest subscribers to this blog, sent me a package to France with a new baseball glove and some under-armour baseball clothing. I wrote him an email to thank him for his gracious gift, and he said that he did not need any thanks, but that if I ever felt obliged I could feature him in one of my blog entries. Well, that time has come. This morning I was reading an article on ESPN.com, an opinion piece giving a rundown of the latest happenings in Major League Baseball, and unexpectedly the [View Full Entry]

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***Updates at bottom*** Brian and Olaf spent another looong day yesterday working on the bus. They started at around noon and worked straight through to 4:30 am. Brian and I woke up at 9:30 today to run to a hydraulics shop just north of Minneapolis. It's about 6:00 pm now and it seems as they are getting close. I still am amazed that they are able to do this whole diesel/vegetable oil conversion at all. They've been talking about it forever and when you listen, it sounds fairly straight forward. Then you go watch them for a bit. Talk of regulators, [View Full Entry]

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This coming weekend we will be going to the Eccentrick Festival in Raleigh North Carolina. Brian and his good friend Olaf have been working non-stop on a vegetable oil conversion for our bus the "Nebuchadnezzar". They hope to have it ready by Thursday morning (its Tuesday night right now). In the event it isn't ready for this trip it will be ready for our tour in November/December. I also purchased a new camera so I won't have to use my phone any longer. :-) [View Full Entry]

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