::Change::

"All changes, even the most longed for, 
have their melancholy; 
for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves; 
we must die to one life before we can enter another." 
::Anatole France::

I am sorry to have left this blog so forgotten!

After living in Ukraine for 18 months, I returned to the US on December 14, 2012 and stayed with my family to celebrate Christmas and New Year's. In January, I moved to Arkansas to begin the next adventure! I am back in school taking pre-medical courses. It'll take around a year and a half to finish up all the pre-reqs, but then I'll be applying to medical school!

My life has been changing, and it is time that this blog changed with it. I'm still figuring out how this will work, but I'm planning to update this blog to my new adventure as a post-baccalaureate pre-med student. I'll leave all the posts from Ukraine able to be found, but they may be moved.

I'm thinking right now I'll be of course updating on life as a pre-med, but also sharing stories from Ukraine and things that are important to me.

If you have any ideas of what direction you think my blog should go, let me know what you'd like to hear!

-ej

::Thank You, America::

"I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, 

one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and 

justice for all."

I currently live in a place where the 4th of July is simply that...July 4, 2012, a day like any other. Even our American-style Independence Day party has been delayed until the 7th of July (crazy, I know!) for our Ukrainian friends and contacts.But the significance of the day is not lost on me. This is the second Independence Day that I have spent as an "expat;" an American living abroad. And I hope it's not my last.

If I was given the choice to live anywhere in the world, I wouldn't pick the United States. My dreams involve living abroad as much as possible. God has given me a heart for missions, and more specifically foreign missions. I want to live abroad, whether its full-time missions or vocational ministry. I would love to live in the United Kingdom, in a jungle in Nicaragua, on an island in the Pacific, in New Zealand, in a hut in Ghana, in the mountains of Tibet, everywhere in the EU, and all over the world.

I really don't plan on living the rest of my life in the US. In fact, I pray for God to give me opportunities not to live in the US.

The fact that I currently live in Ukraine qualifies me as an "expatriot," by the literal sense of the word: a person living in a country and culture other than that of the person's upbringing. And most likely, I will be an "expat" again in the future. However, I've never liked the term "expatriot," because it sounds like I've renounced my allegiance. My allegiance has not changed. Despite things I don't like about America, there are more things I am grateful for including freedom of religion, freedom of speech, freedom to assemble. I can travel around the world and know that the US government will do what it can to protect me as a citizen.

I am proud to be an American.

Traveling opens my eyes to make me that much more grateful for freedom. So, as I celebrate this 4th of July while living in a country that only recently gained its own freedom, I want to say thank you.

Thank you, America, for all who have ever fought for my freedom, especially my own friends and family.

Thank you, America, for giving me freedom so that I can live all over the world. 

Thank you, America, for giving me the opportunity to live in Ukraine. I am so grateful to live here.

Thank you, America, for giving me opportunities in the past to travel to Nicaragua, Mexico, England, Ghana and Italy. Places I dream about seeing again.

Thank you, America, for fueling my dream to live and travel all over the world.

But most of all, thank you, America, for always welcoming me back home.

(credit to Bethany B)

Happy 4th of July.