Greetings

At this time tomorrow I'll be en route from DC to Johannesburg, a 16 hour flight that will take me thousands of miles farther away from the States than I've ever been. After resting up at an airport hotel---they're sending a driver!!!!---I'll fly the next morning to Ndola, Zambia, a city of about 495,000 where I'll spend the next six weeks teaching Java programming and math at Northrise University, the only private university in the country. There will be a safari in Zambia at some point, during which I'll stare down hippopotamuses and wrestle lions with my bare hands; trophies will be available on a first come, first served basis---my bags aren't that big, you know. After that, I fly to South Africa for about two weeks of vacation; I'll start out with a week or so in Cape Town and decide where to go from there. Cage diving with sharks is a possibility, although I might stick with whale watching since that, while being considerably less thrilling, is considerably less likely to give my mother a heart attack.

The purpose of this blog is to keep you, my colleagues, friends, and family, up to date every step of the way. I plan to post at least once every two days, and always with lots of pictures of what I'm seeing and doing. Please, please give comments and questions at the bottom of individual posts or, if you prefer, via email; I promise to be vigilant about responding. I'm also available via Skype (d.winchell) if you want to arrange a chat. (For reference, the time zone is UTC+2).

Here's to the adventure, and especially to hoping I don't die of malaria or some horrible, previously-unknown tropical disease. That would really suck.

--David