Holly is coming!

Holly and me in October 2007 - four years ago!

Holly Higgins is coming to Musoma tomorrow!  (Side note: I wanted to put a nice, more recent picture of Holly up here, but somehow it worked out that all I have is a lot of candid shots that, while cute in their own way, Holly would not appreciate me posting for the world to see...  So anyway, here we are four years ago.  This picture was posed on some stairs - Holly is about a foot shorter than I am.)

Holly and I lived together from July 2007 to July 2008, when I went back to the States for six months.  She took care of the house and cats in my absence, then we lived together again from January 2009 to May 2009, at which time it was her turn to go back to North America for a while.  We met up at my wedding that July (she was a bridesmaid) and then in January 2010 Andrew and I visited her in Langley, BC, where she was attending grad school (at Trinity Western University, the same grad school I went to).  She came out to Tanzania for a couple months to do research for her Masters thesis (which she recently successfully defended!), and is now coming here for a four-month stretch.  She has to return back to the States because she's getting married in February!  Then later in 2012 she and her husband will come back to Tanzania together to live here long-term.

You might recall from previous posts that the house in which Andrew and I are currently living is next-door to the house where Holly and I used to live.  Well, guess where Holly's going to be living when she arrives?  That's right - in the same house she and I used to share!  We may not be able to be housemates anymore since I'm now married and she's about to be, but we'll be about as close as it's possible to get without actually living together.  I'm so excited to have a good friend as my next-door neighbor!