the ants are crawling on my legs.

today i conquered the mighty white Nile.
on a raft.

that's right, i swam and rode and fell into the longest river in the whole damn world and it was awesome.

our guide was a beautifully-built African named Jeffry with a love for western slang...examples of phrases:

"wicked sweet!"
"oh, that's sweet ass"
"oh shit!"
"that's happy days, mate"
(we taught him a new usage for "tight" as well)
and all of this in a real high-pitched, African-trying-to-be-British accent.

of course writing will never do it justice but it made slang seem absolutely ridiculous. and it was hilarious. he was real quirky.

so after 8 hours on the river and all burned shoulders and thighs and noses to show for it (despite multiple applications of spf 50) i am.... we are now better people somehow.

it was also nice to get to talk to (male) westerners for once, since we have very little testosterone to balance our group out. i sat next to a charming aussie named John to and from the river (though it seems like anyone not American who speaks English as a first language is charming)...it was cool but weird.

he spent the majority of the conversation trying to convince me of why i should wait until i'm 25 to marry, no matter how suitable someone may seem...that i need to travel more and live it up and enjoy myself before i'm truly ready for marriage. i'm wondering how much of that kind of worldview is him and how much of it cultural...or at least sub-cultural.

i guess i don't want to be completely independent before i get married. i guess i don't think i need to try more than one person on for size...maybe i'm with someone who makes me better than i could ever be on my own and vise versa and who will continue to do so. maybe i don't need to grow separately to be completely whole. maybe i don't need to 'find myself' completely alone. i mean, i am in africa by myself, aren't i?

i was once again left feeling completely misunderstood...we talked about religion and i felt completely naive...it's much harder describing your faith to someone who has no real religious foundation outside of the post-modern, relativistic view on almost anything like that than it is to someone who at least shares some religious conviction. i guess that's obvious...but i'm amazed at how unintelligent i felt trying to convey the gospel, potentially, to someone with no realized roots in it, compared to the way i would feel conveying those same things to someone who's thought and felt similar things as me. i felt way dumb.

all in all, i listened to some british and american techno on his phone, had my first sip of beer (there was a lot of sun in my head...) ...talked about good movies...and unfortunately our time together culminated in a conversation about the Brazilian (look it up if you dare) and his unnecessarily detailed description of his experience with his ex-girlfriend and hers...i guess europeans are just more liberal about shit like that. more culture shock. anyway...this guy wasn't as creepy as i'm making it seem. it really was nice to be able to talk easily to someone of the opposite sex for once in a pretty good while...i forget how necessary that is...and how relieving it can be, especially when you spend all your time with 12 other girls...

anyway, don't know where i'm going with this. oh yeah, i do now...

i think i was just going to say that talking to john made me realize how young i really am. he's 10 years my senior and is very social...and foreign....and 'cool' whatever that means. it made me feel less alive at first...unsophisticated and, well, naive. but then i felt completely okay with that.

i am young.

i won't deny that i've got a pretty good head on my shoulders...i can't think of anyone who would. but i am young. and that's okay. it's more than okay. it's perfectly fine. and perhaps i can start really believing that's okay and quit trying to always act the equal of all my older friends - in other words, i can stop being inauthentic and perhaps start just being me. and being okay with that despite the things i lack.

i wonder how many different times and in different ways i'll come to that conclusion - the knowledge of the importance of being myself and being honest with myself and loving myself - before it comes to some sort of fruition. wise people have said that progress is three steps forward, two steps back...

but i'm sure i won't notice the development of these traits i want until they've swallowed me up and i've become something even i couldn't have imagined. i mean, that's how it usually happens, right? i think so.