Ngorogoro Crater

We apologize for the late entry, but we were unable to have access to wifi for a couple of days because we went to Ngorongoro Crater! We were prepared to leave for the Crater Wednesday morning by 0800, but we did not set off until about 1100 (African time was a factor)! The purpose of this trip was to clean out the clinics that Green Hope Organization is planning on opening for the Maasai community. We were unsure of what to expect for our accommodations and food therefore, we had to pack easy lunch foods (bread, boiled eggs, oatmeal, etc). There were ten of us in the safari vehicle and although it was a spacious vehicle, by the time we packed our bags, food, cleaning supplies, and paint it was very full. It was a bumpy ride but well worth the drive as we got to see some breathtaking scenery and wildlife along the way (giraffes, baboons, gazelles, and zebras). We arrived at the clinics at about 1800 and got a quick tour before settling into our accommodations, which happened to be a very close walking distance behind the clinics. There was no power in our accommodations so we sat by candlelight and kerosene lamp and listened to the many wildlife outside our doors (some of us were getting a bit “jumpy” and scared of all the foreign sounds)!

The next morning we were up bright and early to get to work. We got a lot accomplished in a short amount of time with lots of help, including from those in the community! We washed walls, swept, and painted; which was a lot of work as it was a fairly large clinic. It was apparent that these clinics are imperative to this community’s well being as their health care was very limited. There was one nurse who used these clinics for care at times. The Maasai community were very eager to help us in any way that they could.

By the end of the day we were all exhausted from a long days work. Earlier in the day, the men had chosen a goat to be eaten for supper (it was in the back of the safari vehicle). The Maasai men cooked and prepared it for us over a fire for supper. We all tried it and agreed that it was quite good! The Maasai people do not waste any food and made a soup out of the goat intestines (although this was not a favourite of ours). We were interested to see that the Maasai would have a spear in one hand and a cell-phone in the other. It was also surprising to us that some spoke English quite well. Maasai are polygamist and usually have at least five wives. Therefore, we were prepared to have possible marriage proposals throughout our stay (we were lucky to not have any direct offers, although we were informed that a woman is worth 9 cows). It was an interesting cultural experience for us all!

The next day (Friday), we finished up with some more painting and then set off at around noon. It was another rainy day but we were able to see a lot of wildlife (we saw about 9 giraffes in a group, many zebras and baboons). We arrived back at the hostel at 1730 and were all eager to have showers and rest.

This will be our last blog post as our experience here has come to an end. It has been an eye-opening and once in a lifetime experience! We have a few days before we head back to Canada, some of us are going on safari others climbing Mount Kilimanjaro and the rest of us vacationing in Zanzibar. I can speak for all of us when I say that we can't wait to come back!

Our new Massai friends!

- Courtney, Raquel and Sam 

Future is Looking Bright

What an EPIC day today!  As you would have read from yesterday, there was free eye clinic being run in a very, rural community. A little boy from one of the orphanages needed his eyes checked and unfortunately, yesterday the line was already to long and we weren’t able to go. Today we made sure that we were there early so that we would be first in line for the registration. Our 6:00 am wake up call was worth it!  Once we arrived at the location safely (the road was quite a roller coaster ride) we had some time to kill so like monkeys, we found a very sturdy tree to climb with the two boys that came with us. It was a lot of fun!

Once the people that were running the clinic arrived, they invited us to help distribute eye glasses. We were helping in the  “glasses room” our duties involved setting up all the glasses in correct prescription piles so that it would be easy to find that right pair for the right person.  The organization partnered with an optometrist from the US and an ophthalmologist from Canada to test people’s eyes. The optometrist had grown up in Tanzania and was returning to start a clinic in another village. The other staff there were some local nurses, two Tanzanian optometrists who specialized in cataracts and severe eye issues, along with many support staff running the registration.  Once we got started there are very few words to describe how we felt when people tried on glasses. As a person who is visually impaired without glasses I know how it is to not see anything. To have been able to witness people being able to see for the first time in their life was amazing. The smiles on their faces were priceless. As for our little boys, the one did not need glasses (yay!), however, the other needs a more precise prescription then what they could do at the clinic (he needs two different prescriptions for either eye). Even though he could not get glasses for free, one of the Tanzanian optometrists pledged to donate a set of frames for him from her shop which makes it a lot of cheaper.  All in all it was an amazing day and it was nice to know the reason for his sight issues and hopefully we will be able to get the glasses he needs as soon as possible.

-Alix and Stefany

Sad, but True

For my post today I am going to talk about events of yesterday and today. This past weekend we had some visitors. They kindly invited a head organizer of Green Hope and us to go see what their company was up too in Arusha. The company that the visitors are with is a huge company with many assets in education, research and health among others. They first brought us to their clinic. It was amazing, they had every piece of equipment and it was all brand new. I felt upset. Only the very rich of Arusha could access the clinic as even health insurance is 180 000 Tanzanian Shillings a month. That is over a hundred dollars American. The average annual income in Tanzania is only about 500USD. It seemed like the people that need help are being forgotten.  The visitors then brought us to some land they had acquired from the government for a project. It was over 3000 acres. You don’t have to be a farmer to know that is a lot of land. Previously, the land was used for agriculture, but now locals are not permitted on the property. There is a fence and multiple guards to ensure this.

During the time in Arusha, I have witnessed a lot of poverty. I have seen too many people that don’t know where their next meal is coming from or even where they will sleep tonight. Seeing such luxury in the thick of poverty was mind boggling and depressing. I am not even sure how to describe the feeling properly. Fortunately, there was a silver lining to seeing all this. While we were visiting the clinic, we were informed that a Canadian and American were in Arusha doing free eye exams. Today, we tried to get a boy from an orphanage in for a free eye exam as he is cross-eyed. Sadly with unforeseen challenges this morning we were unable to get to the clinic till early afternoon. By that time over 105 people waiting for an exam. We will try again tomorrow. Fingers crossed.  

-Stefany

Just Another Day in Paradise

Today as always was another beautiful day in Tanzania, +35 degrees Celsius . The plan this morning was to do head to toe assessments on children ages four to six years old at a school. We got packed up in the Noah (our hearty minivan) and were on our way. We ended up at a school, but the students were adults. After being here for almost five weeks, we are quite accustomed to things going as planned so this was not a problem. We did physical assessments and sexual health teaching to approximately 20 people until lunch time. At that time the adult learners were on break so we talked with some programmers and instructors. They then treated us to tea, bread and butter and fresh fruit. We than parted ways and made our way back home.

Later on in the day, a couple of us went to a market nicknamed the “Mzungu Market” because it is mostly visited by white tourists. It is also more pricey than other local markets. My friend and I bought three mangoes for 3000 Tanzanian shillings (TSh) and I bartered a bunch of sweet bananas down to 2000TSh. I was feeling a little bad that I spent 5000TSh till I did the conversion to US dollars. 1600TSh is equivalent to 1 US dollar so the matunda (fruit) cost me a big total of 3 dollars and 13 cents. Nowhere in Canada would I be able to buy that much fruit so I guess it is not that bad ;)

Goodnight and have a great day,

Stefany

Tour/Info Session

Our day started out with a bit of overcast, and we all found it hard to get going for the day. This morning, we all went as a group to a Training Centre for Development Cooperation. It offers a variety of courses (short courses, language courses and academic programs) and partners with many Universities. If you are not affiliated with a University you are still able to apply for a course (s). Some of the courses include: Child Rights Governance, Grant Management and Fundraising, Human Rights and Vulnerability, etc.  They offer a very planned and organized stay for their students/visitors with Kiswahili and cultural lessons to help those get accustomed to the African culture. It offers the students an opportunity to become a social activist and join together to meet individuals, share ideas and become empowered and knowledgeable about their rights and how they can influence change. The lady who spoke to us was very passionate and stated her philosophy of “Learn, Know and Act”. She stated that you need to act on what you have learned/know to make a difference, which could be something as small as creating awareness. This facility is equipped to accommodate students and/or tourists with all the amenities included (such as a computer lab with free internet, a library, gym, cafeteria, etc.). Overall, I believe we came to a consensus that this would be a great place to study! It would inspire you to advocate for your rights and the rights of others, and help you to create change. After we finished our tour/information session we headed to our favourite local restaurant for some delicious and inexpensive food.

 

Courtney

Mango Tree

Today my group went back to the orphanage from the previous day, except this time we were going to see the primary school where the majority of the children attend. The school is located about 30 minutes by foot through very beautiful landscape. We were escorted by two of the older girls from the orphanage which was great. They chatted non stop about the various fruit trees and the scenery around. Once we arrived we were greeted by the Vice Principle who gave us a brief tour. He then rounded up the 8 students from the orphanage. It was great to finally meet them as we have been to this Orphanage various times and have only meet the younger kids that live there! We also found out that about 8 of the kids from the orphanage attend an elite private school on full scholarships! We were very impressed by this fact and that majority of the kids were in school! After our visit to the school we returned to the orphanage for an afternoon of good fun! We played musical chairs, when was the last time anyone has done that?! So fun!  

The second group had an adventurous day at the Government clinic. They did plenty of antenatal care visits which included immunizations and laboratory work. 

This evening we had an amazing supper by our in house chef! And tonight we are saying goodbye to our buddy from Scotland. He is making his way back to Kenya to continue his volunteer work. We will miss him dearly!! 

Raquel

Kids Kids and more Kids!

Today was yet another day living the good life here in Tanzania! We had our 5^th Swahili lesson to date and we are still quite inept with the language. However, we are trying and have an excellent teacher. Today was all about conjugating verbs, I wouldn’t say we’re masters at it but we sure try!

After Swahili we did a bit of arranging to figure out our day. Here, the days are usually outlined tentatively but can change at any time. It’s quite exciting and nice to get away from the drone of Westernized scheduling and planning. For those of you who know me, yes, I am saying I enjoy not planning, Miss I Love Lists, which seems to be a common title for many in our group. The end plan was for all of us to go to a local orphanage to play with the children for the morning, such a tough assignment!

This orphanage is one of the poorest one’s we have been to since we arrived in Tanzania. The children are at a severe disadvantage as the location of the orphanage is right beside the Arusha dump. However, that does not stop all the children there from being overly joyous and happy. We spent a few hours singing songs, playing games, learning Swahili, and teaching some English. As we were leaving we all had to make sure we didn’t accidently put a child in our bag to take home, they are truly precious children.

Once we were loaded back into our van we set off for an appointment with Centre for Educational Development in Health, Arusha (CEDHA). This is a centre for degree holding health care professionals to continue their education to learn how to teach others in their field. The aim of CEDHA is to ‘strengthen and support the health care system through training of human resources for health in health personnel education, health services management, and continuous professional development’. Our informant at the centre explained that CEDHA has approximately 30 students, which is all their current resources can accommodate. The majority of the students are nurses but they also have professionals from medicine, dentistry, laboratory, and others from all over Africa. They also have a few individuals from Nepal.

We managed to keep busy all the while learning things. It is inevitable to get through a day here without learning at least one new thing. Our brains are constantly on the go whether it’s remembering what to say when someone says ‘Mambo’ (the correct answer is ‘Poa’) or explaining the treatment and management of a patient presenting with pneumonia. Here’s to another week and a little bit in Tanzanian, where has the time gone!

- Samantha