Packing Again

I have spent the evening packing again. Or I never really unpacked on Monday when my visa didn’t come through, so I basically just had to close up my bag. Hopefully, the visa will be ready tomorrow as announced so that I can travel as planned. The embassy is conveniently enough located only two blocks down the street from me, so I will pick up my passport in the morning and then board a flight tomorrow afternoon. Even though I will spend 12 hours or so up in the air, I really look forward to it. For some reason, I get some of my best ideas when traveling and things tend to become more clear. Maybe it is the combination of a physical distance from my everyday life, seeing the world pass by outside the window, and not being able to go anywhere for several hours. Planes, trains, and busses are all the same. I have loaded up with pens, notebooks, and my computer, to use the opportunity to work both on an agricultural policy paper and on an academic proposal. Can’t believe I will be gone for more than a month though – seems like an eternity!

I borrowed a guidebook and a proper camera from a friend, to learn about the places where I am going and to hopefully capture them on pictures. (My own camera is still in NYC.) I also packed a Russian phrase book. I have tried to brush up my Russian this past week, but I have to admit that it’s buried quite deeply back in my language center… 

Packed and Ready to Travel, and… Staying

I have come to realize that traveling for work is not the same as vacation traveling. One thing is the constant change of plans. My three-country trip just turned into a two-country trip because one of my visas got delayed 5 days. I was first told that I would get it last Friday and on Friday they told me today. But now they just called again and told me that it won’t be ready before the end of the week, so I had to cancel part of my trip. So instead of boarding a flight to Europe this afternoon, I guess I am staying in Washington a few more days…

Will unpack one of my business outfits and head down to the office now!

Concerts, a Challenge, and Personal Growth

After a day that started with a dress rehearsal at 8:30 and continued with two concerts and an evening preparing for my trip, I am exhausted but very happy with the day. The concerts went well. I think that most artists are perfectionists and I know that there were parts of the concerts that could have sounded better, but we sang in churches and not in concert halls, and I think that the audience enjoyed the performance. And it was so much fun! I love singing folk music and I love singing with orchestras, and this concert involved both. Finally, I am glad that I pushed myself to sing in the quartette that opened the concert, despite being very nervous about it and feeling immensely insecure. I am not a soloist. Duets, quartettes, etc, are normally fine, but this one was a little difficult and it’s been years since I did more serous singing, so for while, I was ready to let someone else take the part. But it is only by challenging ourselves that we grow, so I decided to go through with it. It went fine of course and I grew in confidence. Will post the video once it’s on youtube.

The cute folk costume that I wore for the concert, which my choir leader Kerstin had made. Not sure what part of Sweden it is from though…

Ten Time Zones to the East

I was thinking a while ago that it is time for a longer trip. Since I moved to DC, I haven’t really traveled that much outside of work and there are so many amazing places to see around the world! But there are so many other things on my agenda this year and I wasn’t sure when to find time for a longer trip. Fortunately, my job solved it for me. On Monday, I am off for five weeks on work in Montenegro, Kyrgyzstan, and Kazakhstan. I am really excited about going! I haven’t been to Central Asia for several years, and it will be my first time in Kazakhstan. In addition, my work there will involve a lot of traveling around in the countries to meet agricultural producers, which is really my favorite part of my job! But first two concerts tomorrow with the Swedish Song Group. Might post a video depending on how I look on stage in a folk costume…

Birthday Week, Cont.

My birthday week continued with another gift arriving from the World’s Sweetest Mia-Lotta. Birthday dinner a day later with Monika (who was out traveling last week) at a French bistro, one of my favorite neighborhood restaurants. A very good week!

Indecisiveness Deciding for Me

A Swedish girl that I sing with gave me a ride to the choir the other day, and during the drive, we talked about what we had done before ending up in DC. Since my story involves clear goals and a lot of moving around, she asked me what I wanted to do next. I didn’t have an answer.

I then chatted with a friend of mine who has been posted in South Sudan for quite some time. He asked me how things were going in DC, and I had to admit that things here were exactly the same as when he left little over a year ago. NOTHING has changed! While I’ve been painfully aware of this for quite some time, my life felt all of a sudden immensely dull.

The problem is that even though I haven’t settled as well in Washington as I did in the other places where I’ve lived, I am also not sure where I would go. For the first time in my life, I don’t have clear plan for the next couple of years. Or rather, the plan that I thought I had proved to be completely beyond my control. Still, I want to give certain things here another chance before giving up on normal and stable. I also really enjoy my job and am very happy about my studies that are progressing exactly in the direction that I want. At the same time, I know that life can be so much more interesting and inspiring. Is this what happens when we get older? We let comfort take over? Did I grow out of my adventurousness? Or do I just feel more at home here than I think? Right now, it seems like my indecisiveness about what to do next means that I am staying here a while longer.

At the Sculpture Garden Café, one of my favorite spots in DC!

Birthday => Birthday Week

And so, I am a year older. Or technically just a day older every day, but as of Wednesday, I added a year to my age. I normally really like to celebrate my birthday properly, preferably with a big party, but this year I had a deadline my Food Policy program and not enough time to get it done before my b-day, so I spent the entire day in front of my computer. (And when I write the entire day, I literarily mean the entire day: I worked on it from 6 am to 11 pm that day!) While I at first was really disappointed that I missed out of celebrating my birthday and everything that I had planned for that day, I soon realized that did spend it on food policy, which is my greatest interest. Nevertheless, there are other components that make a birthday, like friends, cake, and gifts. An acquaintance of mine in Sweden posted a Facebook album around her last birthday called Birthday Week, so I thought I’d copy that idea! It started well enough: these past days, I’ve been celebrated both at my office and outside of work, gifts have dropped in, and I have more plans over the next couple of days. In Moldova, birthdays are really important, and while it is bad luck to celebrate before the birthday, it is OK to celebrate for up to three weeks after. I think one week will be enough in my case though, at least this year!

Some highlights from the past days: cake with a candle from a colleague, chocolate from another, a package in the mail from Felicia with the wonderful book Tuesdays with Morrie and a pretty bookmark (I love bookmarks!!), and a lovely lunch today at Café Leopold in Georgetown with Lucia. And I decided to finally get an i-phone, which I’ve wanted for years, plus found a t-shirt in my favorite pattern! And there are still three more days of this year’s birthday week!