It's that time of the week - injecting a little geographic exploration into an otherwise sedentary life.
I was tossing around a bunch of ideas for this week's Wayfaring Wednesday and then I realized I was tossing them all around in my brain. Which 20 years ago, was on fire.
During college I became very interested in African studies - this was very exciting for me as I had spent a few years not really sure of what I wanted to do. I had a major but I didn't have a clear passion for the subject. After taking an African history course in which I hated the teaching assistant, but loved the class, I knew this was for me.
The summer between my junior and senior years of college I decided to go on a trip to Africa - keep in mind, this was the late 1980's - not everyone was doing it. The one program I found was 6 weeks in Nigeria studying at the University of Ibadan with other American students.
It was a great trip in many ways - I dove into the unknown, went to a country I'd barely heard of, with people I'd never met.
Upon my return to the U.S. I started to come down with weird symptoms. Blurred vision at first and then the fever hit - easily reaching 104 degrees. Ibuprofen would break it and soon it was back up again. My parents took me to my infectious disease specialist in NY City (doesn't everyone have one of those?) - and to make a long story short, I ended up hospitalized for a week with malaria. Later I would discover, cerebral malaria. Not good.
Fortunately for me, my mom is a critical care nurse and was able to take me home after the first week - I spent the second week housebound with round the clock supervision. The fevers had stopped but now I was experiencing severe shaking - my muscles were so out of whack that my arms and legs shook uncontrollably. Try eating like that! Getting fork to mouth was impossible.
After the end of two weeks, I was much improved. And at the end of it all, after the scorching fever, the vomiting, the uncontrollable shaking - the near-death experience, I wanted to go back to Africa.
So that's how I figured out my future career - took a bit of burning my brain to do it.
Did you ever go to a place which confirmed something for you?
I was tossing around a bunch of ideas for this week's Wayfaring Wednesday and then I realized I was tossing them all around in my brain. Which 20 years ago, was on fire.
During college I became very interested in African studies - this was very exciting for me as I had spent a few years not really sure of what I wanted to do. I had a major but I didn't have a clear passion for the subject. After taking an African history course in which I hated the teaching assistant, but loved the class, I knew this was for me.
The summer between my junior and senior years of college I decided to go on a trip to Africa - keep in mind, this was the late 1980's - not everyone was doing it. The one program I found was 6 weeks in Nigeria studying at the University of Ibadan with other American students.
It was a great trip in many ways - I dove into the unknown, went to a country I'd barely heard of, with people I'd never met.
Upon my return to the U.S. I started to come down with weird symptoms. Blurred vision at first and then the fever hit - easily reaching 104 degrees. Ibuprofen would break it and soon it was back up again. My parents took me to my infectious disease specialist in NY City (doesn't everyone have one of those?) - and to make a long story short, I ended up hospitalized for a week with malaria. Later I would discover, cerebral malaria. Not good.
Fortunately for me, my mom is a critical care nurse and was able to take me home after the first week - I spent the second week housebound with round the clock supervision. The fevers had stopped but now I was experiencing severe shaking - my muscles were so out of whack that my arms and legs shook uncontrollably. Try eating like that! Getting fork to mouth was impossible.
After the end of two weeks, I was much improved. And at the end of it all, after the scorching fever, the vomiting, the uncontrollable shaking - the near-death experience, I wanted to go back to Africa.
So that's how I figured out my future career - took a bit of burning my brain to do it.
Did you ever go to a place which confirmed something for you?
1 comments:
Yes, that happened for me when I went to teach in Russia. I can't write about it now, though - it will have to wait until I officially return.
What a horrible experience. And you STILL knew that's what you wanted. Wonderful, when something like that happens.
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