suddenly sudanese

hassa hissa, sudan.

it’s been a full two months – to the day! – since i stepped off the plane, the warm khartoum air hit my face and i got my fist look at this duty country. two months. it’s hard for me to imagine that i've been here that long. time passes so quickly when you spend entire days trying to figure out how to buy a tomato.

anyhow, two months gone means i have just over five months left before i leave for asia. it's about time i start to blog in earnest. it's about time i start to write about khartoum and sudan and the things i've seen here. right now it all seems so distinct and unforgettable, but i know it will all leave me just a few short months after i leave it.

i remember when i first started telling people i was moving to sudan. more often than not, i got some warning along the lines of “don’t die.” sudan, of course, is a place known best by media accounts of civil war, genocide and poverty. but, there's more to it than all of that. sudan is also a place of extreme kindness and – if you let yourself see it – beauty. a place where people spend their entire lives without knowing conflict.

there's no one "true" sudan. just a collection of personal narratives, personal stories. i plan to share mine here.