Kiki's Crossing

11.28.2015 Saturday Feliz dia de la accion de gracias!  Even if it was already two days ago, I still have so much to be thankful for, especially in this last year.  Last year, on the eve of my 20th birthday, I made a Birthday Bucket List. It was the first one I'd ever made, but this year I continued the tradition. As I wrote my new BBL, I looked back at the old one for the first time in many months. Without my knowledge, I (at least halfway) fulfilled a majority of my wishes: eat healthy exercise read God's Word step out of my comfort zone make a difference in someone's life be the type of person I admire meet new people travel take lots of photos (that aren't selfies) put others first study hard journal Granted, some of them I didn't complete in ways I imagined or in the time frame I wanted to, but that's the funny thing about life - it runs on it's own schedule.  Heck, nearly all of my goals are things I still strive to achieve

11.21.2015 Saturday I suppose it was really quite inevitable. It's not as if it was some grand secret, kept locked away in large locked metal file cabinets whose single key is buried in the middle of the secluded forest. Birthdays are much more exciting as a child.  In truth, I already knew this. For the past several years it seems that my birthday is a nice day, maybe even special in a certain sense, yet, I am always left feeling like something is missing. The wispy magic that once surrounded my birthday has faded as maturity and reality has set in. I expect that this, in part, is because I have celebrated my last three birthdays away from my family. Nonetheless, even in my teens, as the sun set marking the end of various birthdays, I was still left longing for something more.  I would never be delusional enough to utter that I've had a bad birthday; how far from the truth! Friends and family always find methods of making the day fun filled and of reminding me of how i

11.7.2015 Saturday How the first week of November, my twelfth week in Peru, has already flown by, I honestly do not know. In many ways, I am completely comfortable here. It really is home. I have established routines, I've adjusted to cultural changes, and I have expectations and understandings of what each day will be like. Yet, it still is a new life to me and perhaps that is why time refuses to slow down. When I ponder my time in Callao, it feels like so much has happened and that I've lived here for more than three short months. Still, at the end of each week I am left thinking, "Another week is gone already?" Such is the life of having two homes on two different continents: constantly craving your old home while knowing that your present home will someday change into your old home. This past week was full of many blessings, as always. Last Friday, the night before Halloween, Kelsey and I went with our Peruvian "siblings" (Berli, Wesley, and Danielito