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Sheila and I left Johannesburg, South Africa on July 12, 2020. We spent 447 days away from our house, sleeping in other people’s beds and having little to no personal space. July 11, 2020 was the last time we ate dinner in our own space and watched people walk up and down our treelined street. Let me say this again, for 447 days we lived with other people and slept in someone’s… Read More
June 4, 2017 was the date of our first wedding anniversary. It is hard to believe that it’s been a year. It feels like just yesterday we were arriving in Abuja settling into our new life as husband and wife. But 365 days later and ten countries visited during our first year of marriage, we are moving into year two of #Shentell. We wanted to share our wedding video to celebrate our… Read More
The other day, I was talking with an associate in London and he asked what I was doing for Christmas. I responded, “I’ll be spending Christmas with the in-laws in Kigali, Rwanda.” He chuckled and said, “boy, you really have become a global citizen!” It is true, my life has taken on a very international flare. While I always joke with my wife that I grew up in a small “village” in… Read More
Leaving Nigeria is never easy…honestly traveling through or out of Nigeria has been the bane of my existence since I arrived in Africa’s most populous country. My blog is littered with stressful and chaotic stories of navigating the Abuja and Lagos airport. You can check out my Christmas 2014 story about the chaos I experienced on my vacation to Germany The Abuja Airport Strikes Again…. This year was no different…and as Sheila can… Read More
Over and over, previously married friends kept telling me not to become so obsessed with wedding details but try and appreciate the process of planning a wedding with your spouse. But what previously married friends didn’t say was that we would be pulled in a thousand different directions – at times, by those same friends. Weddings are a stressful affair but I wish I spent more time taking in my wedding day… Read More
In Rwanda, you have to go before a local government official to be recognized as husband and wife by the government. So officially, we had three ceremonies in Rwanda! During the civil ceremony, two officials representing the local authority read the Rwandan law that addresses marriages. The law addresses everything from how couples share resources to what are the legal grounds for divorce. At one point, the speaker provided me with what qualifies… Read More
What an amazing photo taken by some truly amazing photographers! Sheila and I have been intending to post our engagement photos but we were so overwhelmed with wedding planning that we never could find the right time to post. These photos were taken in April, just five weeks before our wedding at one of the “other” garden we considered for our wedding. We asked our friends Shami and Olivier to help us… Read More
Last week, I made my eighth trip to Rwanda. Rwanda, and specifically the capital city of Kigali has a special place in my heart. It was the first place on the continent that I visited in 2009 and it currently serves as a rest and relaxation destination from the chaos of Nigeria. While my professional life is in Abuja, my personal life seems to exist in Kigali. With Lambert in 2009… Read More
A FREDAY in AFRICA! 