With my mind on Togo

I've been thinking a lot about Togo the past few days. I'm not sure why, but probably because Paris is really, really wonderful and I just reached the half-way point this weekend.  And I'm not going to sugarcoat it, I had been strongly reconsidering going there. 

Honestly the truth is, I've been spoiled here in Paris. My host family makes amazing meals for me (and they give me my favorite cheese every night); I could go out every night if I wanted to since my classes generally don't start till the afternoon; when class does start, a lot of times it's out and about in Paris, learning about the history of various buildings and monuments or analyzing a famous painting at the Louvre or the Musée d'Orsay; I have a crêpe with Nutella at least once a day; and in general, it's low-stress, high-enjoyment.  I have no real obligations.  It's a very cushy lifestyle.

Going to Togo is really going to change everything. I won't have everything handed to me on a silver platter anymore. From what the other Yalie that had her internship in Togo has been telling me, it will be a very trying first few days of adjustment when I get there.  Instead of spending my afternoons discussing the neo-classical elements in a Delacroix painting, I'm going to be working in a village in the dead heat of summer with limited access to Internet.  Somehow that seems way less romantic than I imagined before I came to Paris.

And getting there and back is a logistical nightmare. And my housing there won't be secured until I get there. And there are so many things up in the air about it. But still, I'm going to go, even though a huge part of me is saying not to and just to chill at home for the rest of the summer. Even though it certainly won't be the fairy tale that Paris is right now, I know that at the end it will have been so worth it.

I've realized that this is way more an internship for me than for the organization. I should just admit that to myself right now. They've been getting by with me for years now and they will get by without me when I leave.  I can't make THAT huge of an impact while I'm there (it's such a short period of time...there's no way I can start some ground-breaking initiative or something), so why am I so set to go anyway? I'm hoping that maybe it'll help me clarify my own career path or research interests.  That's really self-interested and borderline paternalistic of me because the alternative, I guess, is "Oh I hate it, I guess development work is not for me, sorry everyone in Africa, back to a cushy lifestyle!"

I don't know I don't know I don't know I don't know.  In the meantime, I'm going to make the most of my couple of weeks that remain of my stay in Paris.