Skyfire24x

I really want to video everything when I walk around to help explain to people what life is like here, but I don't really feel comfortable doing that. I was able to more or less steathily record this street scene from my apartment window. It's a pretty boring video of the street below, and actually one of the quieter and calmer moments. If you have anything that you want me to get on camera here, let me know!... read more

Thanksgiving is my friend Raven's favorite holiday. Aside from the insane amount of food involved, I never really understood why. This year however, I realized that Thanksgiving is an important time, and not just because of the desserts. Thanksgiving is where this all started. It is where everything changed. In 2007, my entire family got together outside of Elkhart, Indiana in a place called South Fork to celebrate Thanksgiving. A few days before my pending departure to Guinea, the day served also a going away party (there were posters with elephants on them that said, "Good luck in Africa, Samantha!") and a pre-mature birthday celebration (birthday cake and pumpkin pie, really what more can you ask for?) A lot has changed since then. One year later I was in the West African capital city of Conakry ... read more

The last three weeks have been filled with enough action to make it feel like it's been a full year. I arrived in Las Vegas two weeks before my sister's due date. Upon arrival, I was a little uncomfortable and disoriented as I often am when I arrive in a new place. I wondered what the hell I was going to do for two weeks before the baby came. Then, surprise, surpise, less than 48 hours after I arrived, Lindsey's water broke! We made our way to the hospital and about two hours later my nephew Owen was born. The next few days were filled with running around, learning how to drive again, doing endless amounts of laundry, and dog-sitting my two new best friends. Things didn't really calm down until after the brit milah the ... read more

I've been told that I need to post a new blog entry, so here we go! After a weekend of finishing up school work and lying in bed watching the entire second season of "How I Met Your Mother" (I'm already ashamed, please don't mock me further), I convinced my roommate that we needed to leave the house. Luckily our good friend Miguel called at that exact moment wanting to get out of the city. So we piled into the car and headed North to Póvoa de Varzim. Up until now, Póvoa hasn't meant much to me except for the last stop way out in the middle of nowhere on the red line, and the summer home of one of my classmates. But upon arriving there it was immediately apparent that we were in a resort ... read more

I remember saying these words in November 2009 and repeating them many times since. I also remember saying I had absolutely no desire to ever live in Europe. Never say never I guess ... Let's back up a little bit ... After the last entry, I went to Morocco for a couple weeks, then flew through Lisbon (my worst flight experience ever) to Boston. I spent about nine months there, worked some random jobs including a couple weeks at the Museum of Science and about five months at Northeastern University. And then something unexpected happened. My friend Liz called me, freaking out because she was leaving in two weeks for Portugal to get an MBA. She asked (what I thought was rhetorically) if I would go with her. I said that due to my first and ... read more