Dear Friends,

I am having some big news: I am leaving Africa.
Yes, who would have thought, hey? After all these years…But it is definitely the right decision and I look forward to new adventures and a new time of my life – in Canada.

Yes, Joshua and I decided to move over to Canada for a while and live in the Western World again. We can stay with his parents for now who live on a farm outside of Edmonton (Alberta) – we will be there for the fall which must be so beautiful.

We are leaving tonight.

We really enjoyed our trip through the region here and saw a lot. Beautiful and thick rainforests, desert, historic sites, elephants and smaller other animals, villages, modern cities and of course markets, people from different tribes and cultures. All in all an unforgettable trip with lots of stories and memories.

And yet, we realised that we want (and need) a break from this place to feel the magic again. We have been here long enough to get a good and clear picture of what is happening, also behind the scenes. And that’s not only nice, easy and relaxed.
We also miss a few things we would like to enjoy again, at least for a while.
Security and health were our biggest issues here: We have been sick a few times during the trip and also during the time we stayed here in Ghana. And there are just some diseases here that are very unpleasant and yet hard to prevent. We hear stories all the times and have by now quite a few to tell ourselves (we had Malaria a few times and Salmonella or another kind of food poisoning just recently).

Security is another big concern. As white people, clearly not from here, it can be a bit hard sometimes without any support system, no family, friends or community behind you – and no functioning system provided by the state either. We feel a bit alone sometimes.

And then of course there are a few things we look forward to having again: A nice home with a fridge with different kinds of food in it, a little bit of entertainment (I still think about the night at the cinema in Burkina Faso!!) and things to do. Even a climate change might be fun – maybe until the first snow??

Yes, I am excited to go.

Of course we are taking our dogs Luke Skywalker and Lara Croft with us which made the trip a bit more complicated. Due to the strict rules in Europe we couldn’t travel via any of those countries (we should have had to send blood samples 3 months in advance!!). We were not sure about the regulations in the US so we were lucky to find a flight via Morocco. We are leaving for Casablanca tonight with a day stopover there; this will give all of us a day of rest before flying over to Montreal the following day. We will then stay a week at the east coast before flying to Edmonton.

This was the best option we could come up with and we surely hope that he dogs will be okay.

So yes, in a matter of hours I will be gone from the African continent. I am still having a hard time imagining that. I have lived here for so long and it’s difficult to even think about not walking in sandals or without any shoes, having all kinds of animals in the street (and people too for that matter!!), sitting under palm trees or hearing the ocean. It is  just a different pace of life and I am sure I am going to miss it at some point and in some ways.

But for now I am super excited about a new part of the world I have never been to and about meeting some new people.

I will keep you posted about my latest adventures – I am sure they will continue, no mater where I will be.

Good-bye for now, good-bye from Africa,

Yours,

Melanie