Aaron and Anne-Sophie

I added a few photos we took in France in our France album. However we’ve been generally taking a break from all the documenting of our time at home in France and California, so sorry there’s not more. I will also begin to remove some of the extra Yemen photos to take up less space. So if you wanted to download any of them, you should do it soon. You can rate photos to help me decide which photos to keep on the site. I will still have all the photos saved on disc in any case. We’ll definitely try to keep the blog updated especially with our move to Washington DC, but expect less updates and in depth blogs as we get more settled. Though I’m sure we’ll continue to add photos and travel, so keep checking it if you want to know what’s the latest. Traveling to places on the East Coast, especially in the Bible Belt, might be as foreign to us as traveling to Yemen. Anne-Sophie is leaving on the 26th for Washington DC and I’ll be there about a week later. We’ll be living in Alexandria, Virginia. We hope some of you can visit us there since it’s just about half way between Europe and California. Our next adventure there should be interesting. We’re looking forward to it.

After a couple of weeks of eating and drinking well with family and friends in France, we’re continuing the same in California thus far. Sushi! Yum! Our flight to the US was hampered by thorough interogations and searches at Charles DeGaulle Airport and Miami, but we made it. It’s a shame that we may have to be continually targeted and treated like criminals just because we have Arab friends in Yemen. It was funny to be told that we needed to hurry to get on the plane and that they would escort us to the gate to help us get there in time, when they really just wanted to keep a close eye on us as suspects. At least we got be the first people on the plane 5 minutes before everyone else. I wish they could just be honest with us especially if they expect us to be honest with them. In Miami, the passport control desk had a piece of paper taped next to the computer showing them how to recognize Yemeni visa stamps, so we knew we would be stopped. We were put into a room full of people of color suspected of something or another, but it went fairly quickly for us after they interogated me and searched our stuff. Anyway we’re back after almost one year. In some ways it’s like we never left and at the same time our lives will never be the same again after what we’ve experienced. It’s often like that after traveling.

We should be in Paris on the 14th. Then we fly out on the 17th to San Francisco.

We’re in Brittany enjoying some time off. I’ve uploaded some photos from Iran in the Middle East Album and have added a few photos from Kenya and Rwanda in the East Africa Album. It’s a little out of order, but we have more time now to work on the site.

I’ve returned from Iran and am in France now. For those of you close to my family, I was sad to find out that my grandfather has died and unfortunately I won’t be back in the US for the funeral. The funeral will be on the 7th. I really thought I would see him when I got back. Below are some thoughts on my trip to Iran. As I’ve said about many countries, Iran is a beautiful and interesting country to visit. Most of that will be shown in the photos in the Middle East Trip Album soon. As ususal I’m going to focus on the current politics and culture in my blog (more…)