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