so i've been pretty terrible about this, huh? i'd like to blame the lack of internet here (seriously, i can skype from, like, three places in the whole country), but, yeah....mostly lazy. however, on my full page, single-spaced list of new year's resolutions, "blog more" is on there. it's right between "wash feet before getting into bed" and "remember that waxing belligerent about the use of human terrain teams for an hour while swilling whiskey is not charming cocktail party conversation." i guess i thought "be less gross and socially stunted, as a human individual" lacked a certain concreteness as a resolution.
anyway! so a sub-list of new year's resolutions is my ADVENTURE LIST. i don't like the term bucket list. it's overdone and is inevitably, if irrationally, linked in my mind with a narrow-minded, middle america ethos that the elitist, nomad snob in me disdains, so i'm going with the far more grandiose ADVENTURE LIST. i came up with it, because i think it's really easy to just float in your bubble of comfort in a place like monrovia, and get in a rut. some of the stuff may not be all that interesting or even possible; a lot of these went on the list because i had heard someone mention them once and i sort of thought "yeah, sure, that seems like it's...a thing." nevertheless, hopefully the (attempted) completion of this list will spawn many blog posts that don't have to do with me making snarky criticisms of other development work or getting all existential and live journal-y. behold, the ADVENTURE LIST:
anyway! so a sub-list of new year's resolutions is my ADVENTURE LIST. i don't like the term bucket list. it's overdone and is inevitably, if irrationally, linked in my mind with a narrow-minded, middle america ethos that the elitist, nomad snob in me disdains, so i'm going with the far more grandiose ADVENTURE LIST. i came up with it, because i think it's really easy to just float in your bubble of comfort in a place like monrovia, and get in a rut. some of the stuff may not be all that interesting or even possible; a lot of these went on the list because i had heard someone mention them once and i sort of thought "yeah, sure, that seems like it's...a thing." nevertheless, hopefully the (attempted) completion of this list will spawn many blog posts that don't have to do with me making snarky criticisms of other development work or getting all existential and live journal-y. behold, the ADVENTURE LIST:
- go up to the roof of the ducor hotel
- go to all three borders (going to all 15 counties seems excessive)
- find the best beach
- climb mt. nimba
- go to the national park
- go to freetown by bus (12 fun-filled hours)
- ride a UN chopper
- learn to cook liberian food
- immerse myself in nollywood (second most prolific film industry in the world, baby!)
- master the liberian handshake
- go fishing and eat what we catch at marlin’s corner
- go on a tour of the club beer brewery
- Extractive Industries Mega-Tour (see a diamond mine, an iron mine, visit Firestone, pan for gold, etc)
- finish (er, start) schwab's tribes of liberia (an old school, 600-page treatise on liberia's "tribes")
- learn to curse in at least three indigenous languages
- learn to wrap a lapa headdress
- go to a soccer game (i will NOT write "football match")
- CHIMP ISLAND (no joke, there is an island full of former lab chimps. you take a boat out and feed them? i don't even know. frankly, i find this terrifying.)
- as always, floss.
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