Happy Thanksgiving!

Today is the American holiday of 'Thanksgiving', a tradition in the States which is among my favourites. Today families join together for good home-cooked food, to spend time together, watch football, and to celebrate all that we have to give thanks for.

Unfortunately for the past 6 years I have been too far away and without enough money to return to celebrate with my family at my grandmother's house, as I did every year until moving to India, getting married and all. It's been good though. Every year since leaving home 6 years ago, there have always been friends (regardless of nationality) around to celebrate the day with - best of all my lovely wife. :-)

Today we wanted to share with you some of the things that are happening here which we are thankful for.

For a long time now, Dana and I have been planning to return to the States to continue studying and finish up the paperwork required to be free to live inside or outside the US as we choose. Many of you know that the process of applying for Dana's visa to come to the States has been a long and complicated one. So we're very happy to let you all know that we are finally very near the end, and that we're now just waiting for an appointment date for our interview at the US embassy here in Romania. This is the very last step in the process where the final approval is given. We are hoping and praying that this will take place by the begining of January! :-)

We also would like to announce that in mid January, I will be starting school at Bloomsburg University in the philosophy department. This is a step that I've been waiting a long time to take and we are both excited for me to finally get back to school!

Because of this, Dana is able to quit her job at the British School. Her last day is just a little more than a week away. This last month or before moving to the States, we wanted to spend with family and friends while we can. Also, the job has been a hard for her and the travel to the other side of the city every day has been quite time consuming. I have to say that I'm very much looking forward to spending our days together this coming month. :-)

Other good news is that this past month I finally got my residence card for Romania (which would allow me to work here if we were staying longer). This is a good thing because it will make it much easier to spend longer amounts of time here without having to leave the country every 90 days and is a step toward potential dual citizanship.

There are a lot of unknowns in our future right now, and although the unknown is scary, and we feel torn between 3 continents and our friends and family scattered across the globe - wishing we could be in 3 or so places at once - we feel that this is the right direction for us and we are so thankful that these opportunities are finally coming to being.

We hope you've had a great Thanksgiving (even if you didn't celebrate it) and that you have a great day.

Peace and Shanti