I want adventure. To new frontiers

I want an adventure. To new frontiers.

When you take all the western countries that are not all the different from Australia, and all the countries that speak English. Also subtract all the exotic tourist destinations that are now engulfed with the creature comforts of those English speaking countries that resemble Australia. And when you take all the places that I have explored though fellow travellers adventure stories I was a bit down at the thought that there was nowhere left for me to explore for myself. In this time of global community and instant communication I hunger to discover new frontiers.

So the plan had been to spend a month in Mali, Africa with one of my best friends who lives there part time. Working as a field research assistant; collecting people dreams and aspirations’ as to how they want to pull themselves and their country out of poverty. Sounds pretty perfect right?

Well it did to me because as a child I dreamed of being an explorer, cutting my way though jungles with just a back pack and wide imagination. So maybe that’s my I was surprisingly unfazed when 3 weeks before departure my guide/ friend/ local expert had to push her portion of our trip back 2 weeks, a luxury among many that I didn’t have.

After a day of letting my imagnation run wild with all the marvellous possibilities of the places I could go and consulting some friends I decided there was nothing better to do than push forward and fly solo in Mali.

Tomorrow I am off to Africa, my first time in a 3rd world country, living where I don’t speak the first or second language. I have briefly met the principle of the local school in Kalabankoro and have faith that he will honour his word and take care of me. I have a body full of travel vaccines, a backpack full of things I hope will be the right things for the life I am about to live and I have a calm feeling which’s powers is not to be underestimated.

Reading travel warning about the place I will be next time I am not living in an airport is an interesting way to spend my last night, warm and safe at home. Mali presents real life dangers, such as kid napping, that my current experience is only though on line research and I don’t wish for it to grow.

Despite serious warnings I can’t help but expect to be blown away by the beauty of the humanity I find as I go off to live real life Mali style.

I am excited and I am nervous and right now I feel like I am winning:)

I once heard a wise friends of mine Ash say “unless you are in mortal danger; fear is your bodies way of telling you you are about to grow.”... So here I go!