Dragonfly Photography

Safari

So I did the safari thing this past weekend. Actually there is only one thing to say: WOW. It is hard to describe the beauty and hopefully I have been able to capture some of it in my pictures. Only took about 900…..

We left on Friday afternoon, 5 people and guide in a very, very old Landrover. Our first stop was in Mbulu, about an hour and a half from Haydom. To check and fasten one of the tires…. This event would repeat itself numerous times during our trip, but if you have ever been on one of the roads here, you know that if a tire would be loose, you would not get very far….

We arrived at Katuro, a town at the foot of the Ngorongoro Crater National Park. We spend the night at our guides parents house. The next morning we packed ourselves in the Landrover and entered the park.

It is the strangest thing. You have seen stuff like this on the discovery channel, animals like this in the zoo. But now, here you are, in the middle of it. The roof was taken off the Landrover so we could stand up and look around. Now it still is the dry season here so imagine the red dust every time someone else would pass us…. But then we were starting to see the animals. Some far away, some close up, like the lionesses having lunch.

After the first day we had dinner at a restaurant owned by a guy from South Africa. Hamburger and fries…. So very western but so very delicious!

On Sunday we drove to Lake Manyara. A totally different eco system, greener and more trees. Warmer and more humid. So more bugs. Again, lots of beautiful views, animals and things to see.

I can go on and on about how beautiful it is. But the best thing is to look at the pictures….Hopefully I will be able to put them on the site, the internet has not been cooperative lately so check back if they are not there!

And after the two days in a Landrover that has seen better days… Paris-Dakkar is for wimps.

Outreach Program

Today, Wednesday October 13^th, we went to the bush… The hospital has an extensive outreach program, 27 clinics total. 21 of those clinics are reached by car, 6 are too remote and a plane will fly out. All the clinics are visited once a month. Every month the nurses will teach how to be healthy, one month it may be about hygiene, one month about family planning. Today it was about how long to breast feed your baby. For most of the women this is the only teaching they will ever get.

We arrived around 11AM, after about an hour in a Landcruiser. Since the hospital is founded by the Norwegian Lutheran Church, there is a service before the work starts. We came to the place and were greeted by singing. I do not know how to explain this, but it is the most beautiful music I have ever heard. Makes me want to cry… By the way, there is a church service every morning before work starts , it’s called ‘sala’, I have been in a church more in the past couple of days than I have been my whole life…

So after the service and the teaching the work started. First everybody has to register. All the babies are then weighed. If they are underweight they have to be admitted to the hospital. If they are below average, they will be examined more closely. The mothers have a chart that they bring to the clinic. The chart holds the development of the child as well as the vaccinations that are done. The charts stay with the moms, and now are required in the schools as proof of vaccinations.

So that was the educational part… Now the real thing.

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