Hello! My name is Averil Sweeney and I am junior majoring in anthropology, and minoring in environmental studies here at Penn State. Next semester (exactly seven weeks and three days) I am going to be traveling aboard to Kenya and Tanzania with SFS. The focus of this program is on wildlife ecology and conservation (along with some cultural mingling between the Masai and other locals). So basically for three months, I will be camping out in two national parks (one in Kenya, the other Tanzania) observing and researching the wildlife around me. I will be taking classes while I am there, some taught by local people, others by the staff. We have one personal day a week, and have to be up at the crack of dawn.

If found that when I talk to most people about my upcoming trip, many of them get excited and giddy when I tell them I am going abroad. When I add on the ever important details of where I’m going, there excited face’s tend to fade and twist and turn into a confused and uncomfortable knot. Then most people ask me, almost horrified, “why there?”.

Honestly, I don’t think I’ll ever fully be able to explain my desire to go, study, and live in Africa to most people. All I can say is that I’ve been dreaming about studying the wildlife, environment, culture, and atmosphere of Africa for my whole life. I don’t think I could possibly rationalize this desire to most people.

That being said, I hope that in this blog I can shed some light on the misunderstood continent that I am going to. I doubt that I will be changing everyone’s mind about Kenya and Tanzania, but hopefully through my experiences people will no longer see it as such an undesirable, foreign place, rather they will see it as I do; a fascinating cultural hot spot full of things to learn.

I’ll post again soon, closer to my trip. For now, focusing on finals. 

Location: State College, PA