Posted by Hanneke on October 17th, 2009 |
2 comments
Today we went to the market. Now it is not at all like the nice, organized farmers market in Mt. Pleasant. This market is located somewhere outside of the village. We went by ‘public transportation’…. Which here means you cram as many people in a Landcruiser as you possible can. If it means people sitting on each others lap, no problem. It is cheap, Tsh 500 (Tanzanian Shilling) so less than $0.50. And you get to enjoy the real thing, right? The smell and dust and being thrown around in the back of the car….Luckily the trip was only about 10 minutes so not too bad.
The market is quite large. You can buy a lot of stuff. Lots and lots of shoes. Lots of used clothing, from Europe and the US. Masaai blankets, fabric, knives, medicine, jewelery and food. We ordered barbeque first before we started to walk around so we could have some food and drinks after the shopping spree. Ofcourse people were staring at us, this group of 7 white people with our guide Clement. We were suddenly the main attraction. Forget about the snakes, forget about the chicken and cows and bulls. Seven white people walking around in the red dust. And with money. You really start feeling guilty that you are this rich westerner and really do not want to bargain the price they ask. But then it is the culture to do so.
After our ‘shopping spree’ we had lunch. The barbeque meat was placed on sticks in front of us and with a knife you were supposed to cut it off. Now I could easily be a vegetarian if it was not for the fact that I really like a hamburger from FiveGuys once in a while. To see the meat here kind of gave me the willies but you don’t want to be a partypooper so you just join in. Plus having a Kilimanjaro beer helped somewhat since the bottles are twice the size of what I am used to. And I am still a cheap drunk…Until the guy that prepared the meat blew his nose in his hands…..not so good. So maybe I will become a vegetarian after all….
So enjoy the pictures I took. It was quite an experience. It’s a shame you cannot put sounds and smells on the pictures because that is something I really do not know how to describe If the pictures are not showing up have patience, the internet is not as fast and reliable as you are used to there in Europe or the US.
Posted by Hanneke on October 16th, 2009 |
1 comment
The orphanage must be the happiest place here. I know that sounds funny, but the babies there are happy, drooling infants that just want to be loved. They live here from newborn to one year. If the mother dies during delivery, the baby is considered unclean for a year and can not go home. This sounds unbelievable for us westerners but unfortunately this is the tradition/belief here. So this morning I was summoned out of my room by one of the other visitors and taken to feed and hold some babies. And it works. To get a smile from a child does wonders for the soul. One of the babies there will pose for you the moment she sees a camera. She is a little bit older than a year and still here because her family can not be located. Her name is Lucy and she is the cutest thing you will see. The orphanage used to be located in the hospital until not too long ago, when they restored an old house on the hospital compound and moved the babies away from the maternity ward. It looks like a nursery that could easily be somewhere at home. Bright colors, pictures on the wall. A bouncy seat or two in the corner. A baby crying somewhere and a baby being fed somewhere. The beds are bunk beds and look like little boxes with a screen in front of it, which is the mosquito net. There is a set of twin girls that sleep in the same ‘box’, they are almost three months old. I held one of them for a long time, she gave me one of those half smiles and finally fell asleep in my arms.
So I am doing somewhat better now. I had a long talk with one of the Norwegian researchers who is an anesthesiologist in an ICU in Norway. She told me that all these emotions are normal, that you walk into a situation where you do not know what the rules are and what the tradition is. And also, all by myself. She told me that I did the best I could do under these circumstances and that this situation (Tanzania, Africa, third world countries in general) is not my fault. That I did what I could with the equipment I had. I think sometimes we think we do good by donating equipment but not realizing that this may make it more difficult in the end. Because if we would not have had one of those anesthesia bags to give this baby CPAP he would not have survived the delivery. Now he lived for 24 hours, but not the best life you would wish for a newborn. So it makes you think a lot about what would benefit the hospital and the people it takes care of.
I still feel that we did too much for this baby and that we prolonged his suffering. And that goes against everything I believe in.
So meet Lucy…..
