my poor mother

A PCV who shared my alma mater was killed on Friday in Lesotho. My friend read about it online and texted me, asking if that was one of the countries I might go to. The story was featured on the online version of our town's newspaper, and I knew it would be front page in the morning. I thought about stealing the paper or cutting the story out before my mom could see it, but I knew that idea wouldn't *really* keep her from hearing about it, or for that matter, feeling good about it once she did find out. She's the only person who has expressed true reservations about me going, mainly because she's worried what will happen if I'm miserable and want to come home, but also because she doesn't want what happened on Friday to happen to me. It doesn't deter me from going at all, but it has made me rethink the notion of truly integrating into a community and taking for granted that fact that most people would look out for me. I feel like I could handle being called names, proposed to by different men ten times a day, but a bullet to the head because I can't understand a mugger? That scares me.

Day six's picture is a fountain in the plaza where I had lunch. I wanted to blur the water a little more than I did, but it was so bright out and I could only close the aperture so far. I was at f/22, shutter speed 1/60, ISO 160.