Why?

Why Establish an Online Journal?

The loving encouragement of my friends and family led me to establish this online journal before traveling to Africa. My girlfriend, Heidi, is a third-year resident of internal medicine at Oregon Health and Sciences University (OHSU) in Portland. In finishing out her residency this year, she is afforded the wonderful opportunity to participate in an elective rotation, and accordingly, we decided to travel to Ethiopia. 

We will be travelling for a total of six weeks. After a week of trekking in the Simien Mountains, our trip will be anchored on a three-week period working in Gondar, a city of around 200,000 people in the north of Ethiopia. Heidi will be working at Gondar's teaching hospital, while I will be volunteering in the town. Heidi's mother, Joan, will then join us for a trip to Kenya and a safari in the Masai Mara with an outfit called Basecamp Explorer before returning to our home in Portland. 

An adventure of this scope seemed to deserve more than simply posting facebook updates along the way, and perhaps a slide show for friends upon our return. I am grateful for the gentle nudging I've received from friends and family to establish this online journal before departing. My hope is that in establishing this simple structure, the content will naturally flow into it as we travel... Hence, a journal with a 'Moving Title'.