All Good Things

Well, all good things must come to an end and my inner-voice saying "stay forever" was silenced by a much more practical one...that must have come from Tim or my parents! Anyway, we're back in America and Tim is getting ready to start working as I continue to look for the "right job." In the meantime, sorting our photos is a fun distraction and I promise we will figure out a way to get all 1356 of them online so you, too, can be distracted by them if you choose!

Ambulance

Here in Livingstone there is one ambulance. By ambulance I mean a 4WD vehicle that would be considered a rugged SUV in the States. The marking on the side of the truck indicates it is a Ministry of Health vehicle intended to be used for promoting childrens' health - instead it is used as the sole ambulance. This is the only means of emergency transportation here in this city of 100,000 residents. However, emergency is also a loose term because people first come to the local clinics, wait for hours to see the clinic officer or physician on duty and then receive a referral to the hospital...then they try to locate this one emergency vehicle.

It is an interesting experience being exposed to the local branches of international aid organizations. Surprisingly, these organizations all have vehicles identical to the one used as an ambulance but it is still unclear to me what they are being used for. There is also a blood bank SUV that appears all over town but I have never heard of a blood bank or of anyone in the hospitals receiving a transfusion! It's hard to imagine what could be accomplished if all of these vehicles were put to use as transportation from the compounds (neighborhoods) into the health care facilities. Maybe it's not so hard to imagine ... less DOAs ariving each day. (here it is "BID" - brought in dead)

Care International has done an excellent job training peer educators in HIV/AIDS prevention and general health outreach. Our friend, Brave, in charge of peer education for the Maramba area was trained by Care and is exceptionally well versed in all local health issues. He is unbelievably dedicated to his community and works all day every day in the clinic, as a radio talk show host and as a friend to his neighbors to educate them and support them in all their health needs. Unfortunately, after all the good training provided by Care he is unemployed - there are no jobs and no funding to employ all of the individuals who are now skilled educators. This extends past Brave's work to the many teachers, nurses and others in Livingstone who are unemployed.

Our time here is soon coming to an end and we have seen so much, made so many friends and gained a little better perspective on this part of the world. I am greatly looking forward to coming home and organizing all of my thoughts and ideas! Not to mention getting all our photos up on this blog - keep checking :)