Would you like a story with that name?

What is a name without the story behind it? Not much really. You have to wonder where people come up with these crazy names nowadays. Apple wasn't too bad but Moses? Really? Why would you do that to your poor innocent child? It's like giving your kid a really really long name with the hard letters in the alphabet. That kid suffers in school while Jack and Jill get off easy with their simple names (ref: Silan: sillin? sih-lawn? sy-lin?).

Now you're probably wondering, why is she rambling about baby names? Is she expecting to name something soon? Something in the near future? Perhaps a child of her own like Silan. Sadly that's not the case. I just thought it'd be interesting to describe how we came across the address and name of our blog. We've discussed at length, since the beginning of this trip, that we wanted to have a blog. Between the two of us, there was just no way we'd be able to keep in touch with everyone over the summer. We're still not quite sure what exactly the internet situation is in Ghana but we're going to keep our time spent indoors at a computer to the minimum.

It started off with a discussion of what we wanted in our blog. What it should look like, colour schemes we enjoyed, blogs that we liked, things we thought would be important to incorporate etc. At first, our blog was a piece of crap. We didn't have a real post, just the usual 'testing, testing, 1 2 3.' Silan went through a phase where she tried all these different templates trying to figure out what looked best. I don't remember what they really looked like only that there was the "Look! We've switched from travelling to start our own IT firm!" or "Someone vommitted on our blog. Oh wait. That's just the most hideous coloured background ever." But we weren't total failures. We came up with both an excellent title AND an excellent URL.

If you haven't noticed already, we're both semi-perfectionists. We wanted a name that was perfect. Nothing with rhyming. Or the word duo. Or duet. As usual we were completely honest with each other about what names we liked and what we didn't. One of Silan's favourite names was "the innocent abroad." I adored the name as well but it was sadly taken. From there it evolved into something french because well, as Silan put it, French is actually sadly a pretty big part of our friendship. I don't think it's all that sad but I guess not that many people are truly dorky and bond over school. In any case, we started thinking of words in french that sounded cool. And the word travel - "voyages" stuck for some reason. It was easy coming up with the rest from there. For those of you who are french-illiterate (or American haha) un récit de voyages simply means a travel story.

The URL on the other hand was harder. Having our blog at unrecitdevoyages.blogspot.com just didn't sound right. Our goal was short and sweet and this time it was Silan who came through. She seemed rather amused with the idea that if you made our last names 'wrong,' you'd end up with Wrong Campus. Clever, non? In fact, Silan is so full of wit and ingenuity that it's surprising she still lives among the common folk (individual in subject denies reports that she wrote the previous sentence).

In this past week, our blog's grown up. Everyday I wake up with multiple emails from Silan saying "I couldn't help myself and added this....and this....and figured out this....and look!!!"

Silan: Hi, my name is Silan and I'm a blogaholic.

Everyone: Hi, Silan.

Monkeys, rabies and Gilligan's Island

Africa's pretty small right? Yeah about the size of Greater Vancouver. I'll just hop on a bus and see the whole thing. Here are a few suggestions from co-workers (lifeguards may know some kick-ass first aid, but that may be the extent of their practical knowledge), get some ivory (fresh), build a pyramid, see a lion, bring back an elephant, go to Djibouti (because it's fun to say). But in all reality, none of those will happen. In all reality, I'm bringing home a monkey and nobody can stop me. Don't worry, I've gotten my shots. Hep A, typhoid, meningitis (times 2), yellow fever, rabies (times 3), polio, and weren't those a basket of daisies? But at least they'll protect me from potential diseases that I may succumb to after the monkey I plan to befriend bites me. I'll get him in the suitcase. Monkey's are suckers for bananas... at least that's what elmo told me.

My dad recently pointed out that my rabies shots were more expensive than my dog's. Was that a hint? I'm sorry, should I have gone to the vet (am I setting myself up?)? Although I must admit, my vaccination experience, though making me feel like an animal test subject, was significantly less scarring than Janelle's. I wasn't forced to bus to the county clinic in Pittsburgh (no offence, Pittsburgh, you've got Crosby after all), and not even get all the vaccinations we need.

If you're wondering why this post sounds so weird, it's because I'm bored out of my mind, not working, home alone with my dog (abandoned yet again!), and last night I watched 4 hours of Lost non-stop before I slept, resulting in a dream that was like Cast Away on the Lost island with the Professor from Gilligan's Island. I really shouldn't have eaten so many Triscuits.

The Final Countdown

Is it my turn now???

It's a little under a month till we leave for the trip of our lives and I think it's time I did a post of my own. Silan is showing off her incredible writing skills and it's my turn to show the world that I can't write. I haven't written anything proper in ages seeing as I'm an engineering student now. Not that there will really be anything proper about our blog but still, I will try my best not to put to shame all the hardwork Crofton put in to me all those years.

As you can only imagine, with this trip looming over our heads, it's been hard to focus on anything. The fact that Silan got out of school almost a month ahead of me didn't help at all. Besides work and bonding with her little child (I use the word child much too loosely), she's had, what felt to me, all the time in the world to discuss important concerns such as visas and vaccines. Being a child myself, I couldn't resist the temptation and chose to talk for hours on end instead of studying for tests and doing homework. Now that that's all done with, I've started up a proper countdown.

I have plenty of time to dwell on every itty-bitty detail regarding out trip. With nothing better to do, I come up with some really great questions such as, "What coloured underwear should I bring?" and "Is it REALLY important to wear sunscreen?" Unfortunately, it isn't exactly easy discussing these key questions with Silan as she's in Vancouver (as always) and I'm nowhere near Vancouver (again, as always). We can only do our best to talk online at the oddest of hours, repeating ourselves many times over because chatting online isn't the same as chatting in person. You'd think that after the years of experience we have with talking over msn and now gmail, we'd have it down but we're definitely far from it. It actually may spice up our friendship a bit seeing as we only really fight when we misunderstand each other online. And by we I mean I; basically, I get mad at Silan and she just waits till I forget about it. Maybe that's why our communication skills are not improving...

While Ghana-filled discussions with Silan are once daily at the very least, the first real heart to heart with my dad concerning this trip occurred recently. His intentions though, seemed somewhat off-target. At lunch today, while trying to sort out whether or not any of the food contained nuts, my dad made it a point to tell me that he'd recently looked up Ghana and found that peanuts are an important part of the Ghanian diet. He then followed that up with the usual "Is there a hospital near by? Do they know about your allergy?" I'd seen this type of talk from both my mom and Silan's parents as they all tried to dissuade us from going on this trip but this was the first from my dad. I knew he really cared about me though, when he told me that if Africa wasn't my cup of tea, I could come home and work here in the Philippines for him. He also added that Silan was welcome to come too. I didn't have the heart to tell him that Silan and I had made an agreement that we wouldn't go home even if we were downright miserable (There are very few conditions under which we'd leave and I don't think our parents should hear this otherwise they might not let us go in the first place!).

Our trip to Africa came up again at dinner, this time the circumstances were more light hearted. My older brother made it a point to ask whether or not my dad and stepmom would be making another tip to Africa (and whether or not he could go) and my dad replied, "Only if Janelle sends us a telegram saying she's dying. We'll go to Africa and save her and then go on a safari!" My stepmom added, "Do that! Send us a telegram!!" We also discussed the prospect of meeting up in London while my father's on business and Silan and I are visiting her older brother Tynan. I mentioned that we'd be staying with Tynan and my dad turned to me solemly and asked, "Does your mother know you're sleeping with a boy??" Oh dad, if only you knew (JUST JOKING!!!!).

Silan always concludes with these meaningful and what I think are, incredible sentences but I'm no Silan so I'll end with this:

What do you call a man with no arms and no legs in your pool?
BOB!!!!!

Now Playing: Kill by Jimmy Eat World

Taking things a little too far since 1986

Note the elaborate design of this blog.
Note the "handwritten" font.
Note the carefully selected color scheme and matching photos to go along with it (see: photo accompanying "Discovering your inner cheese")
Note the pseudo-African theme.
Note the background as a contrast-ridden, colour-enhanced, photoshopped picture of 2 Ghanaian boys holding traditional masks.
Note the fixed background as you scroll.
Note the top ten list.

Ergo, We've taken things a little too far.

The point of this post was so that I could use the word ergo.