Two weeks, officially.

So, it's now official. In exactly 2 weeks time, I will be enroute to London then passing on to Cape Town, RSA. I can't believe it's coming so close, and part of it still doesn't seem real. I am going to Africa. I am going to see and be able to converse in person with my aunt and uncle for only the second time in my life. Wow. It's surreal.

I have spent most of my life communicating with my relatives in brief conversation over the phone at Christmas for as long as I can remember. Our Christmas tradition will always remain the same - get up at the crack of dawn (before 7 am) and call Africa. It's brief snippets of conversation as the phone is passed from family member to family member on both ends of the line. Small little pieces of conversation that can never really convey what has been going on in life of someone else so far away for an entire year. It was so much harder years ago, email and direct connections over the phone have simplified things, but all the same, it's not quite personal.

But there was a brief time, when I was just the age of seven, I spent some time in person. It's hard to remember all the details and events with the same vividness that I can remember last week, but it was good. There were stories from my grandmother, and small gifts from my aunts. There were geckos on the ceilings, and lucky beans to be found. There were Zulu dancers, crocodile farms and Zimbabwe ruins. There were friends, there were relatives, there were strangers. It all just sort of melds together...

Now, life has presented my family with another sweet encounter together. Sadly, some of the family is gone, passed away since the last visit, but they shall be remembered. But somehow there is the hope that these newer memories will last all the longer, and the bonds will be tighter, and the situation will just be good. And that is my hope, my dream, my expectation...