The Dream

We have our plane ticket, the majority of our gear and a loose plan for trekking through the southern region of Africa. Like many adventures, this one started as a dream. Well actually, it didn't start out with some grand vision of traveling the world -- although that is where we're at now. Najam literally awoke to the Toto song "Africa" ringing in his head. You know, the one that goes "I bless the rains down in Africa" often misconstrued to say either "I guess it rains down in Africa" and "I wrestled Marines down in Africa."

He's not sure where or why he awoke to this song but the unconscious works in funny ways.

I hear the drums echoing tonight
But she hears only whispers of some quiet conversation
She's coming in twelve-thirty flight
Her moonlit wings reflect the stars that guide me towards salvation
I stopped an old man along the way
Hoping to find some old forgotten words or ancient melodies
He turned to me as if to say: "Hurry boy, it's waiting there for you"

It's gonna take a lot to drag me away from you
There's nothing that a hundred men or more could ever do
I bless the rains down in Africa
Gonna take some time to do the things we never had

The wild dogs cry out in the night
As they grow restless longing for some solitary company
I know that I must do what's right
Sure as Kilimanjaro rises like Olympus above the Serengeti
I seek to cure what's deep inside, frightened of this thing that I've become

Hurry boy, she's waiting there for you

The words had a strange ambient relevance to the time and place we were at, and suggestions of new times and new places we could be. So, tallest peak in Africa, here we come!