T-minus 23 Days
First off, I would like to thank all the people that have made my gap
year possible. Thank you to all my teachers that motivated me through
high school. Thank you to my friends and family who are supporting my
year abroad. Thank you to all the people that donated toward my
fundraiser. Thank you to the part-time wanderer I met in the Himalayas
(you know who you are). The next eight months I owe to all of you.
Second off, I will be writing this blog periodically throughout the next
year to help share my experience I will be having while in Senegal. With
that being said, I have never written a blog before, and besides the
essays I wrote throughout high school I’ve never done any formal
writing. (Not that I’m planning that this blog will be very formal). My
mom says that I’m a good writer; but she is also the same person who
says Downton Abbey is better that Game of Thrones, so I don’t have a lot
to go off of there. I plan to use this blog as a platform to crack jokes
about anything and everything that is going to happen to me over the
next ten months, hopefully making my entranced readers slightly smile or
chuckle under their breath for a second. Now that I’ve addressed the
housekeeping stuff, please enjoy the next nine months of my life though
this blog.
I’m going to guess that most of you readers already know me, but for the
concerned citizen that has been lucky enough to avoid me up until this
point I will introduce myself. I am Erik Oline, I am 18 years old, I
stand 6’2” tall. Earlier this summer I graduated from Ashland High
School in Ashland, Oregon. Pretty much all I’ve done this summer is go
fly fishing; I work at a fly fishing summer camp where I get paid to
teach kids how to fly fish. And when I’m not at “work” I’m usually
fishing. (Yes, I’m bringing a rod to Senegal.) After spending a year in
Senegal as a Global Citizen “Fellow” I will be attending the University
of Montana because there’s a trout river that runs right through campus.
I’m a simple man.
I decided I wanted to take a gap year pretty much overnight, although I
never thought that I would have the luck to do it with Global Citizen
Year. After sending in the application, a few weeks later I found out I
was going to Senegal, sweet! I try to be as spontaneous as possible with
my future; plans restrict an open mind. Before Global Citizen Year I
knew very little about Senegal. Its capital is Dakar, it’s in west
Africa, and they have lots of peanuts— that was the extent of my
knowledge about my home for the next eight months. Now I know lots more
about my next home country; off the coast there’s a good population of
sailfish, marlin, tarpon and dorado. Inland there is potential for
tigerfish, Nile Perch, kafue pike (whatever that is), several species of
catfish, and much more. It sounds like a nice place.
I leave for my Global Citizen Year in 23 days, and I’m beyond excited.
It is a bit daunting. Eight months is a long time, but I feel as ready
as I can be. Looking forward to the future of this blog I will keep
posting as much as possible, or whenever anything significant about my
year abroad happens. I have no idea how much internet access I’ll have
while in Senegal, but I will make an effort to keep all of you avid
readers on the edge of your seat. I think that should do it for my first
entry. If anybody has any questions for me please ask away –
erik@jeffnet.org – . For any complaints, please click the X in the top
right, I’ll have my representative will speak with you. Thanks for
reading and enduring the pain of my jokes. Until next time – Erik out.
