Epic summer countdown

Now that I've laid out my life plans, it's time to lay out my summer plans. For quick and easy reference, I am referring to this summer as Operation Acquire an Intestinal Parasite and Huge Carbon Footprint While Changing the World and Learning How to Milk Cows (OAIPHCFWCWLHMC, for short).

First stop: Greece. I'm chilling with my family for about ten days in Athens and on two Greek islands. This will not accomplish any of the world-changing or cow-milking alluded to in my operation, but it will make a dent in the carbon footprint. Also, I will probably get a nice tan.

Second stop: Ghana. I'm interning with my dad's company, Burro, which sells things designed to allow people with almost no money to be more productive. Right now, they rent rechargeable batteries and sell battery-powered LED lights (which replace kerosene lanterns) and battery-powered cell phone chargers. (Many/most Ghanaian villages have no electricity, so cell phones usually get rounded up by an enterprising person and taken to an on-grid location to charge. This is very inconvenient and costs people a decent amount of money.)

After doing some market research with existing clients, Dad is looking at expanding into agricultural inputs, so I will be researching options for this with a Ghanaian university student. I have really mixed feelings about offering people in developing countries (or anywhere, really) agricultural chemicals. On the one hand, ag chemicals are demonstrably pretty not-good for life. On the other hand, Ghanaian farmers are going to use pesticides whether we supply them or not (probably), and it's so completely not my place or job to go around lecturing actual farmers about how to feed their families. So I will try not to worry too much about the macro effects and focus on learning cool stuff about micro-level agricultural policy and marketing and telling people's stories on the Burro website.

I'm really excited for this, though. For one, I've never had a proper full-time internship with a large degree of autonomy. Much less one in Ghana where I'll be working with a Ghanaian student. I'm hoping to learn as much as possible about the lives of Burro customers, agriculture-related or otherwise. I'm also looking forward to driving the official Burro pickup truck, which is painted bright lime green and has a donkey's head on it (painted, that is. Not a real donkey's head.) Also, I plan to acquire at least one intestinal parasite in Ghana. Maybe I can even break my weight-loss-due-to-violent-illness record (last trip, I was there for 2.5 weeks and lost about 15 pounds).

After Ghana, I'll be home for about a month. Most likely working for my corporate overlords and spending the rest of my time reading about Ecuador.

And then...Ecuador!!! I just got official confirmation that I get to spend two weeks before my study abroad program starts working on an Ecuadorian farm/wildlife refuge. According to the email from the guy who runs the place, I am expected to work 7am-3pm weekdays doing any and all of the following things:

-cultivating the fields 
-taking care of both wild and domesticated animals
-fixing fences
-building
-milking cows 
-any other thing that we need to do


Which means OMG I GET TO LEARN HOW TO MILK A COW. This is serious, guys. This is worth at least +15 hippie points.


And then I'll be studying abroad!


I'm off in a little over a week, and I'll try to update as much as I can while I'm traveling the globe. Hopefully I won't get killed by a cow, or the aforementioned intestinal parasite.