starting this up again

Hi, friends!  So, in the last post I made on here, I said there would be more to come soon ... and then have written nothing for over a year and a half. Sorry!

Rather than calling this blog "phoebe's page," I guess I should have called it "phoebe's africa blog," because that seems to be the only time I update it.  Yes, for any of you who may not know, I'm back in Africa -- a little more long-term this time.

On January 30, 2008, I officially took up residence in Kigali, Rwanda, where I'll be living and working for the foreseeable future. After running my own business from April 2006 to July 2007, Compassion offered me a new job that was too good to pass up. I'm now overseeing training and support for all field communications and tours/travel staff in Compassion's Africa Region.

I'm currently boarding with some wonderful people until my permanent housing is available sometime in March. In my first 5 days living in Kigali, I'm starting to sort out how to get places, where shops are, etc. And, after 6 months of trying to do my job from the States and simultaneously prepare to move internationally, I'm now getting very excited at the prospect of focusing on my work.

In other news, on January 28, 2008, en route to Kigali, I got engaged! My fiance (wow -- that is the first time I've written that) is a wonderful man called Joe who currently lives in Edinburgh but who will also be relocating to Kigali later this year. We'll finally get to be on the same continent!

I don't have any photos to go with this post, but hope to have some soon. There are also loads of stories I could already tell from my first few days here, but I will save those for later. For now, I just wanted to get something on "paper" to say hello and get myself back in the habit of writing these.

Lots of love to everyone!