At the end of this month, it will mark exactly one year since my move to Nigeria. It has not been an easy transition but somehow I have managed to survive the chaos that is Nigeria. To celebrate my one year anniversary, I boarded a Lufthansa flight bound for Frankfurt, Germany and got the hell out of town. I was eligible for my annual leave that provides a roundtrip ticket back to the United States. I also needed to renew my visa for Nigeria. My visa expired on May 14, 2015. While I have to spend a week in headquarters conducting meetings and visiting with staff, I get a two week vacation to Mount Vernon, Alabama. When I was growing up, I could not wait to get out of Mount Vernon. Now as an expat, I can’t wait to get back to Alabama.

I kicked off my leave with an overnight stay in Frankfurt, Germany. Frankfurt has become like a second home for me to get away from the hustle and bustle of Juba and Abuja. My friends who live there always ensure I have a good time and reintroduces me to the comforts of the Western world. I arrived in Frankfurt on a federal holiday so most of the stores and businesses were closed. However, there was a wine festival happening downtown so we were able to drink wine (and beer), eat brats and crepes and spend a beautiful day outside (things I don’t get to do in Abuja).

Now, I am home…officially I am in Washington, D.C. but as long as I am in the borders of the United States, then I will always be home. And for a decade, I lived and worked in Washington, D.C. so this too is like home.  I am looking forward to catching up with friends and family while in the United States and a brief vacation into the Great Smokey Mountains. I think Dorothy said it best as she was trying to get back to Kansas, “there is no place like home…”