i am often thankful that i have any friends at all because i know that i'm crazy and have been known to pick up and move to asia without much notice. however, i am especially thankful that i have true friends who are going through the same thing that i am, though all in spanish instead of chinese and with gunshot cats instead of chopsticks.

in one of my weekly hours-long skype sessions with my best friend veronica (who lives in mexico), we are sharing the stories of the insane things that happen to us while being in another country, and discussing what our next adventures will be. its so nice to be able to talk about the feeling of randomly wanting to eat at stameys or not being able to think of a vocabulary word in english or pronouncing an english word in the accent of the country we are living or how we (thankfully) have the mindset that our 20s are the time we should be seeing the world and actually doing things instead of getting married and popping out babies. its really nice to have someone who can understand what you mean when you say, "man, i love eating with chopsticks, but sometimes i want a fork more than anything." or "only 8 more months until we can go wreak havoc on greensboro again!" sometimes i feel like no one understands. and until you have literally packed yourself up and popped into another country, the depth and multitude of feelings can't be properly understood. they are strange, hilarious, horrible, and wonderful.