Well I guess it's been a while since I last put up something for the reading public to purview. It's not that nothing has been going on but it's just become normal everyday stuff and doesn't make me think that it's blog worthy.
The new news on the street, is that Neil and I are leaving Heri on Friday to start a week long trip down to my parents' house in Mozambique. Since our construction job ended here we're going to go down and work for Maranatha for a month and a half. We'll be driving trucks, putting up One Day Churches, doing data entry on the website and all kinds of other stuff. Not to mention getting to eat my mom's amazing food. I have to admit that I do have some ulterior motives in heading south. Not cooking for myself is one of them:)
Well this is all there is until after our week long trip full of bus rides across deserted regions of eastern Africa. Should be interesting.
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Driving in the Slow Lane
I think it’s been long enough since I last wrote so now I can put up a post about all of the non-experiences that I’ve been having recently. It’s been pretty slow around here. Which has its benefits.
After we got back Milton and Shirley (the Canadian couple in charge of construction) left for Arusha to pick up some building supplies and see more of Tanzania. They were supposed to be gone for a week and Neil and I were in charge of the construction project during that time. Well their trip turned out to be longer than expected and we got to be in charge for two weeks. Also happening during January and into the beginning of February were lots of surgeries. I got to see a bunch of hysterectomies along with other random surgeries that I don’t remember what they were. There has been a Danish doctor here since we got back who has been performing surgeries. He comes over here every year for a few months. He brought another volunteer with him. She wanted to watch surgeries to decide if she wanted to go into medicine. Mid-way through January a German doctor showed up to get some experience for a couple months. She and the two German nurses that are here along with the Danish girl left the beginning of this month to do some traveling around Tanzania. Before they left Neil and I had been going over and hanging out with them pretty often. We got to watch lots of Friends episodes and play some Uno.
Nothing else has been going on. Oh, except we did find a chameleon on the way back from the market one evening a couple weeks ago. He was named Oscar and after a few pictures was placed in a little tree in front of our house. Haven’t seen him since but I’m sure he’s having a good time somewhere.
We found out the approximate time that we’ll be leaving Heri to head down to my parents’ house. We’ll be leaving the end of April and then spending most of May with my family in Mozambique. The reason we decided to leave at the end of April is because that’s when Dr. Rocero is going on his annual leave back to California. The construction part of our job is ending in a couple weeks when the Petermans leave for Canada.
Well I think that’s all. I hope you all have had a wonderful February!
After we got back Milton and Shirley (the Canadian couple in charge of construction) left for Arusha to pick up some building supplies and see more of Tanzania. They were supposed to be gone for a week and Neil and I were in charge of the construction project during that time. Well their trip turned out to be longer than expected and we got to be in charge for two weeks. Also happening during January and into the beginning of February were lots of surgeries. I got to see a bunch of hysterectomies along with other random surgeries that I don’t remember what they were. There has been a Danish doctor here since we got back who has been performing surgeries. He comes over here every year for a few months. He brought another volunteer with him. She wanted to watch surgeries to decide if she wanted to go into medicine. Mid-way through January a German doctor showed up to get some experience for a couple months. She and the two German nurses that are here along with the Danish girl left the beginning of this month to do some traveling around Tanzania. Before they left Neil and I had been going over and hanging out with them pretty often. We got to watch lots of Friends episodes and play some Uno.
Nothing else has been going on. Oh, except we did find a chameleon on the way back from the market one evening a couple weeks ago. He was named Oscar and after a few pictures was placed in a little tree in front of our house. Haven’t seen him since but I’m sure he’s having a good time somewhere.
We found out the approximate time that we’ll be leaving Heri to head down to my parents’ house. We’ll be leaving the end of April and then spending most of May with my family in Mozambique. The reason we decided to leave at the end of April is because that’s when Dr. Rocero is going on his annual leave back to California. The construction part of our job is ending in a couple weeks when the Petermans leave for Canada.
Well I think that’s all. I hope you all have had a wonderful February!
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
The Journey Continues
Well here’s the second episode of my Christmas adventures. I figure I should probably get caught up to the current before next Christmas comes around. So after we got down to my parents’ house we left the next day to go with a volunteer group from South Africa to build a church way out in the boonies. We spent a few days there, stayed for the dedication and then headed back to Maputo. During this time I got to do some much missed driving, even if it was on the wrong side of the road and I had to shift left handed. Once we got back home the days became extremely relaxing. We’d wake up and then spend the day not having to do anything. Got lots of internet time in, watched pretty much all the seasons of Cosby show, and went swimming a few times in the pool.
We went to the beach one day. We drove up north of Maputo to a beach that you have to take a ferry to get to. The ferry was a really old boat that held maybe four cars precariously placed. Once we crossed the river we got to drive over a few kilometers of REALLY muddy roads. It was lots of fun going into mini lakes and hoping the truck didn’t totally submerge. At the beach we used a surfboard and a boogie board we had borrowed from my uncle to have some fun in the waves. My attempts at surfing never ended up amounting to much. Maybe next time. It was a steep beach so there were some large waves landing right on the beach. Each time trying to ride up to the beach ended up with one of us getting rolled through the water and bouncing of the bottom. I imagine I know what it would feel to get flushed down a toilet now.
Christmas was lots of fun. My mom gave us tons of food stuff to bring back up here which has been highly appreciated. On the 30th of December we drove over to South Africa and spent four nights and five days in a game park. We got to see pretty much all the good stuff. I got to see my first cheetahs in the wild, we saw lots of lions, a couple of leopards, lots of elephants (one herd numbering over a hundred), white and black rhino, and all the other ones. A couple of our campsites had hyenas walking on the other side of the fence, only a few feet away. Loads of good pictures and then we were back in Maputo. Our border crossing on the way back happened the last day of South African holidays so the line waiting to cross from the Mozambiquan side was like 10 km long. Ours thankfully wasn’t too bad. The next day my dad and I went to the US embassy to see if I could get more pages put in my passport. I was down to only two and a half blank visa pages and Neil and I still had a bunch of borders to cross before we go back to the States in June. When we first showed up they wouldn’t let us in because we hadn’t made an appointment. Then we were told that the lady who adds pages wouldn’t be in till later. So we drove all the way home and then a couple hours later we learned that she was in and could help us if we got right down there. After checking in to the embassy I only had to fill out one piece of paper and then twenty minutes later we were leaving and my passport was 25 pages thicker. It’s kind of crazy how they put in more than it comes with originally.
The next day we packed up our stuff and left super early in the morning in order to make it all the way to Johannesburg in time for our flight. After a goodbye and my mom giving us even more food to take we sat in the airport for a couple of hours until our flight left. Our flight into Dar landed at 7 or something and we cleared through immigration easily with our residence permits. Before leaving Dar on our way down we had made a reservation with the YWCA, where we were staying, for some nights in January on our way back. Upon arriving there the guy couldn’t find our names in the books but was nice enough to just let us sign in and then he gave us a room key. The next day we went to the airline office to try and get a flight back to Kigoma because after our train ride Neil had decided he wasn’t interested in ‘experiencing’ the train again:) We managed to pick up a couple round trip tickets without too much hassle, and then spent a couple more nights in Dar till our plane left. Once we got back to Heri everything settled into its normal routine except for a couple of changes. Two days after we got back Milton and Shirley left for Arusha up north and we were in charge of the construction for two weeks. Another difference is that there are a couple of new people here from Denmark, a doctor and a girl interested in becoming a doctor, and a doctor from Germany who just finished her schooling there. All those people are only here for a couple of months.
Well I hope this wasn’t too disjointed and some sense can be made out of it. Maybe in May I’ll put up another post of everything we’ve done:)....or maybe before then.
We went to the beach one day. We drove up north of Maputo to a beach that you have to take a ferry to get to. The ferry was a really old boat that held maybe four cars precariously placed. Once we crossed the river we got to drive over a few kilometers of REALLY muddy roads. It was lots of fun going into mini lakes and hoping the truck didn’t totally submerge. At the beach we used a surfboard and a boogie board we had borrowed from my uncle to have some fun in the waves. My attempts at surfing never ended up amounting to much. Maybe next time. It was a steep beach so there were some large waves landing right on the beach. Each time trying to ride up to the beach ended up with one of us getting rolled through the water and bouncing of the bottom. I imagine I know what it would feel to get flushed down a toilet now.
Christmas was lots of fun. My mom gave us tons of food stuff to bring back up here which has been highly appreciated. On the 30th of December we drove over to South Africa and spent four nights and five days in a game park. We got to see pretty much all the good stuff. I got to see my first cheetahs in the wild, we saw lots of lions, a couple of leopards, lots of elephants (one herd numbering over a hundred), white and black rhino, and all the other ones. A couple of our campsites had hyenas walking on the other side of the fence, only a few feet away. Loads of good pictures and then we were back in Maputo. Our border crossing on the way back happened the last day of South African holidays so the line waiting to cross from the Mozambiquan side was like 10 km long. Ours thankfully wasn’t too bad. The next day my dad and I went to the US embassy to see if I could get more pages put in my passport. I was down to only two and a half blank visa pages and Neil and I still had a bunch of borders to cross before we go back to the States in June. When we first showed up they wouldn’t let us in because we hadn’t made an appointment. Then we were told that the lady who adds pages wouldn’t be in till later. So we drove all the way home and then a couple hours later we learned that she was in and could help us if we got right down there. After checking in to the embassy I only had to fill out one piece of paper and then twenty minutes later we were leaving and my passport was 25 pages thicker. It’s kind of crazy how they put in more than it comes with originally.
The next day we packed up our stuff and left super early in the morning in order to make it all the way to Johannesburg in time for our flight. After a goodbye and my mom giving us even more food to take we sat in the airport for a couple of hours until our flight left. Our flight into Dar landed at 7 or something and we cleared through immigration easily with our residence permits. Before leaving Dar on our way down we had made a reservation with the YWCA, where we were staying, for some nights in January on our way back. Upon arriving there the guy couldn’t find our names in the books but was nice enough to just let us sign in and then he gave us a room key. The next day we went to the airline office to try and get a flight back to Kigoma because after our train ride Neil had decided he wasn’t interested in ‘experiencing’ the train again:) We managed to pick up a couple round trip tickets without too much hassle, and then spent a couple more nights in Dar till our plane left. Once we got back to Heri everything settled into its normal routine except for a couple of changes. Two days after we got back Milton and Shirley left for Arusha up north and we were in charge of the construction for two weeks. Another difference is that there are a couple of new people here from Denmark, a doctor and a girl interested in becoming a doctor, and a doctor from Germany who just finished her schooling there. All those people are only here for a couple of months.
Well I hope this wasn’t too disjointed and some sense can be made out of it. Maybe in May I’ll put up another post of everything we’ve done:)....or maybe before then.
Sunday, January 11, 2009
Planes Trains and Automobiles
Well I guess it’s safe to say that a lot has happened in the life of Justin since my last post following Thanksgiving. Instead of writing a ten page essay to talk about it all I’m going to write a bunch of different posts about different parts of what’s happened.
From Thanksgiving to December 11 when we left Heri for Kigoma to get on a train not much happened out of the ordinary. Because of that I’m just going to start off with the train escapades. We had made bookings a few weeks in advance and we had reserved a first class room which we were told would have two beds and we could be by ourselves. On Thursday December 11th we rode into Kigoma in the hospital car. Although we had been told that it would leave at 6:30 a.m. it of course didn’t end up leaving till several hours later:) Once in town we dropped off the doctor who was flying to Dar es Salaam and then went down to the train station to find out just when our afternoon train was going to leave. The station master informed us that the train wasn’t leaving that day. That was a surprise! We came back a little while later with a guy from the hospital who could translate better for us and we learned that the train had broken down and would be arriving and then leaving the next morning. After that cheery bit of news we found a place to spend the night and then the next morning arrived at the station early enough to end up sitting around for a while with hundreds of others. The train actually did end up leaving within an hour of its scheduled departure. Once in our ‘room’ the unique experience started. The mental image I had created about what it was going to be like probably belonged to a US train ride because this was far from what I had expected. The room had two beds, one on top of the other, a window with a stick to keep it shut, and a sink that didn’t drain and had bugs floating in it. So yeah, it was the Ritz Carlton. But I was still really looking forward to this whole train riding experience. The trip is usually supposed to take two nights and one day but ours wasn’t the ‘usual’ trip:). We ended up being on the train for 50 hours.
Soon after leaving the station I was standing in the hallway with my head out the window when a guy came up and started talking with me. He was pretty nice and didn’t seem like the serial killer type so we talked for a little while. Then I realized where this was heading when he started to tell me how he was such a poor man (riding first class) and then he told me I should give him my watch. I declined his generous offer of my donation to him and then later he wanted to come into our room and talk with us. That didn’t end up happening because I didn’t figure it was a smart idea to let him see all of our other stuff so he could start asking for it. It’s nice that he was a friendly con man. The mean ones are just no fun.
Due to the 50 hours we spent on the train even though we left in the morning we still ended up with two nights aboard the Polar non-Express. The first night wasn’t so bad. We had the window open and it was actually kind of cool so besides the fact that a big rat had run through our room all was good. The second night however was entirely different. We still had another rat run through but this time it was incredibly HOT and then the train stopped in a town and didn’t leave a half-hour late like usual. After talking with some people we found out that there was another train broken down on the tracks ahead of us so we’d have to wait till it got out of the way. I ended up spending the hours from 1 to 4 in the morning outside sitting in this train station because it was cooler than our room. I got to meet a 17 year old guy named Edward who came up to me and said that he hoped he wasn’t bothering me but he wanted to practice his English. We ended up talking about all kinds of things. It was pretty cool. After the train finally left and I got back to sleep I was awoken by something biting my foot. Not a mosquito kind of bite but more like something sinking its fangs into me. I came to the land of full consciousness quite rapidly mostly because I thought it was the same rat that had run across me the night before. I kicked my sheet off and found that I wasn’t missing any appendages so tried going back to sleep. When I got up later in the morning I found a HUGE bug in my sheet that had been trying me out for taste.
All the fun didn’t end with our arrival in Dar though. We had asked the doctor to make a reservation for us at the YWCA before we arrived. He had called us while we were on the train and informed us that the YWCA and the YMCA were fully booked. We weren’t sure what we were going to do when we got off the train but we grabbed a taxi and went to the YWCA in the hopes that something had opened up. God is amazing and lo and behold they had a room we could have for a few nights till our flight left for Johannesburg, South Africa. That was the end of the excitement of our trip to my parents’ house in Maputo Mozambique. My dad met us at the airport in Joburg and by that evening we were eating enchiladas that my mom had expertly crafted:) Well that’s the end of the travel down. Read the next post about what I did over the few weeks I spent in Mozambique.
From Thanksgiving to December 11 when we left Heri for Kigoma to get on a train not much happened out of the ordinary. Because of that I’m just going to start off with the train escapades. We had made bookings a few weeks in advance and we had reserved a first class room which we were told would have two beds and we could be by ourselves. On Thursday December 11th we rode into Kigoma in the hospital car. Although we had been told that it would leave at 6:30 a.m. it of course didn’t end up leaving till several hours later:) Once in town we dropped off the doctor who was flying to Dar es Salaam and then went down to the train station to find out just when our afternoon train was going to leave. The station master informed us that the train wasn’t leaving that day. That was a surprise! We came back a little while later with a guy from the hospital who could translate better for us and we learned that the train had broken down and would be arriving and then leaving the next morning. After that cheery bit of news we found a place to spend the night and then the next morning arrived at the station early enough to end up sitting around for a while with hundreds of others. The train actually did end up leaving within an hour of its scheduled departure. Once in our ‘room’ the unique experience started. The mental image I had created about what it was going to be like probably belonged to a US train ride because this was far from what I had expected. The room had two beds, one on top of the other, a window with a stick to keep it shut, and a sink that didn’t drain and had bugs floating in it. So yeah, it was the Ritz Carlton. But I was still really looking forward to this whole train riding experience. The trip is usually supposed to take two nights and one day but ours wasn’t the ‘usual’ trip:). We ended up being on the train for 50 hours.
Soon after leaving the station I was standing in the hallway with my head out the window when a guy came up and started talking with me. He was pretty nice and didn’t seem like the serial killer type so we talked for a little while. Then I realized where this was heading when he started to tell me how he was such a poor man (riding first class) and then he told me I should give him my watch. I declined his generous offer of my donation to him and then later he wanted to come into our room and talk with us. That didn’t end up happening because I didn’t figure it was a smart idea to let him see all of our other stuff so he could start asking for it. It’s nice that he was a friendly con man. The mean ones are just no fun.
Due to the 50 hours we spent on the train even though we left in the morning we still ended up with two nights aboard the Polar non-Express. The first night wasn’t so bad. We had the window open and it was actually kind of cool so besides the fact that a big rat had run through our room all was good. The second night however was entirely different. We still had another rat run through but this time it was incredibly HOT and then the train stopped in a town and didn’t leave a half-hour late like usual. After talking with some people we found out that there was another train broken down on the tracks ahead of us so we’d have to wait till it got out of the way. I ended up spending the hours from 1 to 4 in the morning outside sitting in this train station because it was cooler than our room. I got to meet a 17 year old guy named Edward who came up to me and said that he hoped he wasn’t bothering me but he wanted to practice his English. We ended up talking about all kinds of things. It was pretty cool. After the train finally left and I got back to sleep I was awoken by something biting my foot. Not a mosquito kind of bite but more like something sinking its fangs into me. I came to the land of full consciousness quite rapidly mostly because I thought it was the same rat that had run across me the night before. I kicked my sheet off and found that I wasn’t missing any appendages so tried going back to sleep. When I got up later in the morning I found a HUGE bug in my sheet that had been trying me out for taste.
All the fun didn’t end with our arrival in Dar though. We had asked the doctor to make a reservation for us at the YWCA before we arrived. He had called us while we were on the train and informed us that the YWCA and the YMCA were fully booked. We weren’t sure what we were going to do when we got off the train but we grabbed a taxi and went to the YWCA in the hopes that something had opened up. God is amazing and lo and behold they had a room we could have for a few nights till our flight left for Johannesburg, South Africa. That was the end of the excitement of our trip to my parents’ house in Maputo Mozambique. My dad met us at the airport in Joburg and by that evening we were eating enchiladas that my mom had expertly crafted:) Well that’s the end of the travel down. Read the next post about what I did over the few weeks I spent in Mozambique.
Thursday, November 27, 2008
Thanksgiving...Only Comes Once a Year
Happy Thanksgiving!!
It’s crazy how fast time goes by. Today Thanksgiving...tomorrow New Years. Before I know it I’ll be heading back to school and Africa will be a large collection of memories and pictures (most of those being Neil’s:). Well my time spent here has given many things to be thankful for. Like the fact I haven’t gotten malaria or any other strange illnesses. I’m also quite thankful for something that hasn’t happened yet...our upcoming trip to Mozambique. We leave here two weeks from today and after five days finally arrive at my parents’ house in Maputo. The train ride has me particularly excited. Maybe I won’t like the idea so much after having done it but who knows?
Last Sabbath was my turn to teach Sabbath school. The whole teaching, leading out in discussion thing isn’t exactly my piece of pumpkin pie. I mean I definitely enjoy talking and discussing ideas with people but the ‘in charge’ part is what gets me. Despite all that it went pretty well. Thanks in a large part to the fact that some members of the class enjoy enlightening others with stories of their past;)
I don’t know if I’ve talked about our pet, Frank (RIP). We had wanted a pet here so when we found a praying mantis in our kitchen a month ago we named him Frank and he became our pet. We figured this would be beneficial to both parties because he would get to eat mosquitoes and have the honor of being our pet and we would have a pet that could keep us company while cooking and just look cool. He hung out for a couple of weeks and we would find him all over the kitchen. Pretty much a “where’s Waldo” kind of thing. His favorite spot ended up being our compost bucket so we had to watch when we through stuff in there or outside so as to not injure dear old Frank. Then came the fateful day. The lady that takes care of the guest house where we live was doing some cleaning and decided to be nice and take out our compost. Poor Frank went out with the bucket and didn’t come back. It’s taken us a while to get over that tragic loss. For a while at just the mention of the name Frank, Neil and I would burst into tears. Imagine our joy when Neil saw a praying mantis on the outside of his bathroom window. I escorted the new Frank into our kitchen and set him up in a comfortable spot near the window. He doesn’t look like the old Frank but he still has the charming praying mantis manners. I’m going to have to look into the airline policies on bringing pet praying mantises into the U.S. for when we go home.
Note: For those who don’t quite know when I’m being serious, some parts of the above paragraph are exaggerated, slightly, to protect the integrity of the story.
Tomorrow there are a bunch of head honchos from the States showing up for some meetings here this weekend. They leave on Sunday and then Monday there are 18 others from Tanzania that are arriving to have some year-end meetings. Due to the large number of people coming on Monday, Neil and I are going to have to move out of our rooms and spend a couple of nights at a pastor’s house. Should be an interesting weekend.
Well I’ll probably write once more before we leave for Mozambique. I’m going to go prepare a little Thanksgiving feast of foods not native to Tanzania. Have a wonderful holiday season! And listen to lots of Christmas music because it’s been shown to increase brain function in 75% of the mice that were subjected to it continuously for one month.
It’s crazy how fast time goes by. Today Thanksgiving...tomorrow New Years. Before I know it I’ll be heading back to school and Africa will be a large collection of memories and pictures (most of those being Neil’s:). Well my time spent here has given many things to be thankful for. Like the fact I haven’t gotten malaria or any other strange illnesses. I’m also quite thankful for something that hasn’t happened yet...our upcoming trip to Mozambique. We leave here two weeks from today and after five days finally arrive at my parents’ house in Maputo. The train ride has me particularly excited. Maybe I won’t like the idea so much after having done it but who knows?
Last Sabbath was my turn to teach Sabbath school. The whole teaching, leading out in discussion thing isn’t exactly my piece of pumpkin pie. I mean I definitely enjoy talking and discussing ideas with people but the ‘in charge’ part is what gets me. Despite all that it went pretty well. Thanks in a large part to the fact that some members of the class enjoy enlightening others with stories of their past;)
I don’t know if I’ve talked about our pet, Frank (RIP). We had wanted a pet here so when we found a praying mantis in our kitchen a month ago we named him Frank and he became our pet. We figured this would be beneficial to both parties because he would get to eat mosquitoes and have the honor of being our pet and we would have a pet that could keep us company while cooking and just look cool. He hung out for a couple of weeks and we would find him all over the kitchen. Pretty much a “where’s Waldo” kind of thing. His favorite spot ended up being our compost bucket so we had to watch when we through stuff in there or outside so as to not injure dear old Frank. Then came the fateful day. The lady that takes care of the guest house where we live was doing some cleaning and decided to be nice and take out our compost. Poor Frank went out with the bucket and didn’t come back. It’s taken us a while to get over that tragic loss. For a while at just the mention of the name Frank, Neil and I would burst into tears. Imagine our joy when Neil saw a praying mantis on the outside of his bathroom window. I escorted the new Frank into our kitchen and set him up in a comfortable spot near the window. He doesn’t look like the old Frank but he still has the charming praying mantis manners. I’m going to have to look into the airline policies on bringing pet praying mantises into the U.S. for when we go home.
Note: For those who don’t quite know when I’m being serious, some parts of the above paragraph are exaggerated, slightly, to protect the integrity of the story.
Tomorrow there are a bunch of head honchos from the States showing up for some meetings here this weekend. They leave on Sunday and then Monday there are 18 others from Tanzania that are arriving to have some year-end meetings. Due to the large number of people coming on Monday, Neil and I are going to have to move out of our rooms and spend a couple of nights at a pastor’s house. Should be an interesting weekend.
Well I’ll probably write once more before we leave for Mozambique. I’m going to go prepare a little Thanksgiving feast of foods not native to Tanzania. Have a wonderful holiday season! And listen to lots of Christmas music because it’s been shown to increase brain function in 75% of the mice that were subjected to it continuously for one month.
Monday, November 17, 2008
Home 'Sweet' Home
What is the one thing that makes a place home? I’ve always heard the saying ‘home is where the heart is’ which is not well worded because your heart is always wherever you happen to be. I had taken the saying to mean that home is wherever the people are that you care the most for. In today’s modern age of satellite internet connections, cell phones, and internet phones even though you may not be near people you can still keep in pretty close contact with them from anywhere around the globe. Because of that and the fact that I have multiple homes due to my family living all over the world I’ve decided that there must be something else that makes home, home. This past week I came to the realization of what that certain something is....food. No matter where you are the food of home can make the place you’re staying seem like you’ve always been there. This outstanding epiphany came about because of a couple of packages that Neil received last week. They both contained seasonings, something that we have been doing mostly without for a while now. Saturday night Neil decided to use one kind of seasoning to make a dish like his mom makes. I forgot what it’s called but he did a remarkable job and the kitchen reminded me of smells from his house back in Roseburg (thank you Mrs. Patel for sending that stuff..it’s amazing:). So that meal and Neil’s and my recent talks about how soon we’re going to get to eat at Taco Bell have settled in my mind the issue that food makes a place home. Oh and on a side note we aren’t going to get to eat at Taco Bell until June 10, 2009 at approximately 3 pm in San Francisco during our layover.
Let’s see, what other interesting stuff have I been doing? On Sunday evening we had our first group movie night. Neil and I have had movie nights each Saturday night be we finally got together with Lydia (German nurse) and Lucas (pharmacist) to watch a movie we borrowed from the doctor. Oh, last Thursday a new nurse, Ina, arrived here from Germany. She’s going to be here for a whole year. She stopped in Arusha on her way here and brought us a package from our friend Katie who’s working at Cradle of Love there (thanks tons Katie! :).
The weeks are in a nice routine and have been flying by. It’s hard to believe that we left Portland two months ago. Also rapidly approaching is our trip down to Maputo, Mozambique to spend Christmas with my family. I’m looking forward to that very much! Between seeing my family, eating lots of amazing food, and getting access to unlimited internet usage I’m sure that the time there will be quite enjoyable! It is also going to involve a train ride. I’ve never traveled anywhere by train before but we’re going to be spending two nights and one day on a train going from Kigoma all the way across Tanzania to Dar es Salaam. Should be pretty fun...at least for me:), Neil loves going places just not all of the traveling it takes to get there:).
Even though Thanksgiving hasn’t come yet I’ve already started listening to my Christmas music in preparation for the holiday season. Some people have said that Christmas music should only be listened to from Thanksgiving to the 25th of December but I am of the opinion that Christmas music can be listened to all year long. When discussing this with others I then cite the study that has shown listening to Christmas music lowers the chances of a person becoming depressed (I just need to find out if a study like that has been done yet).
Well I’m writing this late Monday evening and I don’t think my brain is fully functioning anymore so I apologize for any muddled ideas and jumbled sentences. Have a fabulous week!
Justin
Let’s see, what other interesting stuff have I been doing? On Sunday evening we had our first group movie night. Neil and I have had movie nights each Saturday night be we finally got together with Lydia (German nurse) and Lucas (pharmacist) to watch a movie we borrowed from the doctor. Oh, last Thursday a new nurse, Ina, arrived here from Germany. She’s going to be here for a whole year. She stopped in Arusha on her way here and brought us a package from our friend Katie who’s working at Cradle of Love there (thanks tons Katie! :).
The weeks are in a nice routine and have been flying by. It’s hard to believe that we left Portland two months ago. Also rapidly approaching is our trip down to Maputo, Mozambique to spend Christmas with my family. I’m looking forward to that very much! Between seeing my family, eating lots of amazing food, and getting access to unlimited internet usage I’m sure that the time there will be quite enjoyable! It is also going to involve a train ride. I’ve never traveled anywhere by train before but we’re going to be spending two nights and one day on a train going from Kigoma all the way across Tanzania to Dar es Salaam. Should be pretty fun...at least for me:), Neil loves going places just not all of the traveling it takes to get there:).
Even though Thanksgiving hasn’t come yet I’ve already started listening to my Christmas music in preparation for the holiday season. Some people have said that Christmas music should only be listened to from Thanksgiving to the 25th of December but I am of the opinion that Christmas music can be listened to all year long. When discussing this with others I then cite the study that has shown listening to Christmas music lowers the chances of a person becoming depressed (I just need to find out if a study like that has been done yet).
Well I’m writing this late Monday evening and I don’t think my brain is fully functioning anymore so I apologize for any muddled ideas and jumbled sentences. Have a fabulous week!
Justin
Friday, November 7, 2008
Thank Goodness God Sent a Rainbow or We'd be Gonners
A merry November to you all!
We’re going on two months spent here at Heri and by now I’ve gotten quite used to our routine. It’s nice to have a routine, although the occasional surprise is also enjoyed to break up the monotony. The past week has indicated in a very visible way that the rainy season is here or just around the corner. Each day we’ve had showers. They may only last for 20 minutes before it clears up and appears nice and then later in the day the sky will be dark and I’ll be thinking that I’m about to get swept away in a flood comparable only to Noah’s. The silver lining on this one is that it means we get power all the time, and our water hasn’t run out recently either although it is muddy all the time now. Nothing like drinking a boiled mud puddle.
The construction projects are coming along pretty well. The rain has caused the project that Neil and I oversee to be postponed because there aren’t roofs on those houses yet so they can’t really work on them while there’s a river flowing through the house. We’ve instead been helping supervise the guys working on a duplex near the guesthouse where we live.
Yesterday we were about to watch a video at Milton and Shirley’s (Canadian couple) house when we heard a helicopter. We had been told that occasionally patients requiring immediate care will get brought in on a helicopter owned by an organization in Kigoma. Since we saw that the helicopter was going to land here we decided to go down and see if there was going to be a surgery on the suspected patient. When we got down to where they had landed we found out that there was only the pilot and a lady with him (obviously not from around here). We went over to meet them and were introduced to the pilot who is a doctor from the States but has been working in Africa for a while and the lady who is a nurse just visiting for ten days from Chicago. Although they hadn’t brought a patient it was cool to get to see the helicopter (unfortunately didn’t get a ride...yet) and talk with a couple Americans. Most of the hospital staff speak English but talking with someone that fully understands everything you say is so refreshing.
After talking to them for a bit we went over to the OT (operating theater) to see if there were going to be any surgeries that day. While we were in there a lady showed up at the hospital needing a c-section. I was pretty excited because I had missed out on the other couple of c-sections that Neil had gotten to see. The lady was 40 years old and ended up having a healthy baby boy. It was really cool to see how fast the doctor gets the baby out and then hear it crying within a minute after he pulled it out. I think that c-sections are going to be really cool surgeries to watch more of but watching that one made me really thankful that I’m not going to have to have any babies in my life time. Selfish, I know but it’s still something I’m glad of. My pain threshold is quite low...scratch that, it’s extremely low.
Well away from surgeries...of which I’m going to put some pictures up soon...this week had one other notable highlight. We were invited over for a spaghetti lunch at Milton and Shirley’s. Getting to eat food that we don’t prepare for ourselves and also having it taste really good is always a special treat. This was no exception. I’m glad people view Neil and I as being two poor young men who have to rough it on our own cooking, and this sympathy leads to meal invitations. I must mention that we’ve actually made some pretty good food ourselves and we in no way are starving but it doesn’t hurt to eat elsewhere:)
I think that’s about it. Oh yeah, I learned this week that my blessed country has a new president. My political standing is pretty apathetic although I do have strong views on subjects. The one nice thing about being in Africa is that I didn’t have to watch all the news intent on smearing one candidate or the other. Although it’s really surprised me how many people here follow our elections and have a favorite pick for president, usually based on the candidate’s foreign policy. Imagine that. Well yay for the democratic process and I wish that we had been nearer one of the six or seven places in Tanzania where the US embassy threw election-day parties.
I hope everyone is having a magnificent fall and I thank you all for the comments you’re going to leave and the emails/letters you’re going to send.
We’re going on two months spent here at Heri and by now I’ve gotten quite used to our routine. It’s nice to have a routine, although the occasional surprise is also enjoyed to break up the monotony. The past week has indicated in a very visible way that the rainy season is here or just around the corner. Each day we’ve had showers. They may only last for 20 minutes before it clears up and appears nice and then later in the day the sky will be dark and I’ll be thinking that I’m about to get swept away in a flood comparable only to Noah’s. The silver lining on this one is that it means we get power all the time, and our water hasn’t run out recently either although it is muddy all the time now. Nothing like drinking a boiled mud puddle.
The construction projects are coming along pretty well. The rain has caused the project that Neil and I oversee to be postponed because there aren’t roofs on those houses yet so they can’t really work on them while there’s a river flowing through the house. We’ve instead been helping supervise the guys working on a duplex near the guesthouse where we live.
Yesterday we were about to watch a video at Milton and Shirley’s (Canadian couple) house when we heard a helicopter. We had been told that occasionally patients requiring immediate care will get brought in on a helicopter owned by an organization in Kigoma. Since we saw that the helicopter was going to land here we decided to go down and see if there was going to be a surgery on the suspected patient. When we got down to where they had landed we found out that there was only the pilot and a lady with him (obviously not from around here). We went over to meet them and were introduced to the pilot who is a doctor from the States but has been working in Africa for a while and the lady who is a nurse just visiting for ten days from Chicago. Although they hadn’t brought a patient it was cool to get to see the helicopter (unfortunately didn’t get a ride...yet) and talk with a couple Americans. Most of the hospital staff speak English but talking with someone that fully understands everything you say is so refreshing.
After talking to them for a bit we went over to the OT (operating theater) to see if there were going to be any surgeries that day. While we were in there a lady showed up at the hospital needing a c-section. I was pretty excited because I had missed out on the other couple of c-sections that Neil had gotten to see. The lady was 40 years old and ended up having a healthy baby boy. It was really cool to see how fast the doctor gets the baby out and then hear it crying within a minute after he pulled it out. I think that c-sections are going to be really cool surgeries to watch more of but watching that one made me really thankful that I’m not going to have to have any babies in my life time. Selfish, I know but it’s still something I’m glad of. My pain threshold is quite low...scratch that, it’s extremely low.
Well away from surgeries...of which I’m going to put some pictures up soon...this week had one other notable highlight. We were invited over for a spaghetti lunch at Milton and Shirley’s. Getting to eat food that we don’t prepare for ourselves and also having it taste really good is always a special treat. This was no exception. I’m glad people view Neil and I as being two poor young men who have to rough it on our own cooking, and this sympathy leads to meal invitations. I must mention that we’ve actually made some pretty good food ourselves and we in no way are starving but it doesn’t hurt to eat elsewhere:)
I think that’s about it. Oh yeah, I learned this week that my blessed country has a new president. My political standing is pretty apathetic although I do have strong views on subjects. The one nice thing about being in Africa is that I didn’t have to watch all the news intent on smearing one candidate or the other. Although it’s really surprised me how many people here follow our elections and have a favorite pick for president, usually based on the candidate’s foreign policy. Imagine that. Well yay for the democratic process and I wish that we had been nearer one of the six or seven places in Tanzania where the US embassy threw election-day parties.
I hope everyone is having a magnificent fall and I thank you all for the comments you’re going to leave and the emails/letters you’re going to send.
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