As deeply as the death of our smallest charge affected me
personally, I cannot let that be the last entry in the blog. A couple others are on the list of
contributors, but I know they are consumed by travel weariness and jet
lag. Hopefully, they will add their reflections too. Thankfully, Dan McIntyre notified
me that our intrepid travelers, you recall AKA “the fun group,” arrived home
unscathed, though not without a little scare when two nearly missed the plane
in Amsterdam.
Birdie and I remain in Iringa until Friday when we will
indulge in a new experience and fly from Iringa to Dar es Salaam. As an aside, we have contemplated using this
transport both ways, to and from Iringa to Dar.
However, we tend to bring significantly extra baggage that does not
return home with us, e.g. computers thanks Dan, Gary and Margaret!), some
medical supplies, scrub suits intended to be left behind, this year hospice
kits (thanks Jill Strykowski and Allina Friends!) and quilts for the new
nursing student class, a donation of 17 stethoscopes (thanks Dan and Sue
McIntyre and 3M!), 2 soccer balls, (Dan and Sue), some resuscitation equipment
(thanks Jon Koratoff and Nadia Juneja), education supplies from Lauren Turner’s
boyfriend’s church (Mike, I hope). And
that was just with the fun group and with apologies to those I may have missed! So it
should be apparent the difficulty we would have on the entrance trip. And the group would miss the thrill of Mikumi
National Park and the surprise of seeing African animals up close for the first time.
All in all, it was a terrific experience for me as
always. I miss being with the larger
group more. Cannot be helped, I suppose,
being relegated to the fun group.
We (the collective, not the Royal) continue to learn things
as our experience grows. Well, duh, you say. Me too.
As an experiment this year, because in the end we had the room, we had a
couple non-medical personnel with us. As
always, this had some unexpected consequences.
Dave diligently walked daily to the Ilula Orphans Program (IOP) where he
learned vernacular Kiswahili and worked hard.
Dan made forays to several schools and was the resident computer expert.
Obviously these were highly useful things to do, but could be done anytime
other than the medical trip. We have had
students in the past who stayed at IOP and occasionally visited us, an altogether
different experience.
This time after the official experience has inspired, or perhaps incited, the
contemplative side of me. I am trying to
write a “Code of Conduct,” and also a specific waiver regarding use of the public
transportation. Having a coaster bus at
our disposal, mostly unused on a daily basis, is a burdensome expense; our
travelers have been quite insistent that they want to ride public
transportation. Yet our biggest risk in Tanzania is (motor vehicle) accident,
not TB, HIV, malaria or the other maladies we tend to worry about (not even
Zika or Ebola). Bummer, since the
crashes are virtually all preventable.
I will end on a high note. Once again, the trip was
rewarding and memorable for me. My hope
is that our crew feels the same way! We
have met lifelong friends here in Tanzania that we look forward to seeing every
year. I truly hope my path crosses those
of all our travelers’ soon and often in the future!
Enjoy the photos below! Or above. I will publish them separately, since Blogger is misbehaving.
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