Who we are

Find out about the people behind Haydom Luteran Hospital and Haydom Health.

Donate

Help support the great work at Haydom Lutheran Hospital.

Our History

How did Haydom Hospital arise. What has happened and where are we heading.

Volunteering at HLH

Want to help out? Check out this guide to volunteering at Haydom Hospital.

Learn Swahili

Swahili is a prominent language in Tanzania. Learn the basics for fun and education.

Saturday, March 30, 2013

Happy Easter from Tanzania


The Bible tells us that Jesus Christ came to do three things. He came to have my past forgiven, you get a purpose for living and a home in Heaven - Rick Warren

Just a short one today, to say Happy Easter to everyone I know around the world.

I'm currently, relaxing in Meru House Inn in Arusha which I would recommend to all travelers. It has all the basics like hot water, a bed and wifi. Plus there is breakfast each morning.

We don't have any Easter Eggs for tomorrow, but somehow I think we will survive.

Thursday, March 28, 2013

The Odd One Out


We boil at different degrees - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Like this sunflower in a field of maize, being in Africa can make you feel like the odd one out. I would not characterize this as a bad thing, if anything it adds another dimension to your experience.

On my first day at Haydom, I met a large number of the other volunteers, medical students and guests at Haydom Lutheran Hospital (HLH). Unsurprisingly (at least to me), I was something of a novelty. Where as most of the volunteers are from Europe (especially Norway), here was this lone Australian. Not a single person knew where I was from without me telling them. First I was English, then American (someone even spread a story round that I came from a ranching family in Texas) and all sorts of places in between.

The Dongobesh Experience
As much as I was a novelty to the HLH community, as a foreigner (Kiswahili: Mzungu) you stand out in general in Africa. On my second day in Haydom, the Egenberg Family (Signe, Art and Lars) offered for me to go with them to visit some of their friends in Dongobesh. However, the car only had space for four and there were six of us going.

What were we going to do?

The answer was simple, two of us would ride in the tray-back/trailer of the truck. The two lucky volunteers for the first part were myself and Lars, as we were the youngest. So we set off for our two hours journey to Dongobesh, holding (or clinging) onto to the truck's rollcage.



As would come to no surprise too many, the roads were rough and full of holes. And so if you ever find yourself in the back of a truck, on dirt roads anywhere in the world, my advice would be stand up as much as you can. This saves you a lot of pain down the track. The downside is that you might get flipped off the back of a truck if you hit anything. So weigh up the pros and cons.

So here we were, a pair of Mzungu on the back of a truck; and quite possibly the oddest thing around. As we drove along the road, through towns and farmland, people would point, wave and look with almost a sense of shock. It's not uncommon for many Africans to ride on the back of a truck, but clearly Lars and I brought a different aspect to a common thing.

In Dongobesh, we met the Egenberg's friends, who are both highschool teachers (one teaching English, the other Kiswahili). It was at their house that I had my first family cooked meal in a Tanzanian household. And what can I say other than that the food was superb, and was all from produce (e.g. Icrops & animals) right in their very yard.

Whilst I was at their house, their kids inevitability caught a glimpse of my iPhone (I was using it to take photos). Being curious little critters, they wanted to look at it, which I happily obliged. The two boys loved it and were constantly battling over who's go it was to use it. The most amazing thing I saw was that, a four and a seven year old who had never seen a touch screen phone before, who couldn't speak or read english, pick an iPhone up and within the space of 30 minutes know who to navigate it. A win to Apple I guess for intuitive design. Somewhat to my angst, the only game I had on my iPhone Zombie Highway, which basically involves running over and shooting Zombies. I thought it was probably not a good lesson for young kids that the way to succeed is to see how many bodies you can run over. I'm sure others would argue however, that everyone, including man, woman and child, needs to be ready for a Zombie Apocalypse. 

Eventually we had to say our goodbyes and make our way back to Haydom. But, not before we took a walk through the fields outside of Dongobesh (where the above photo was taken). During this walk, we had the opportunity to see how things had been done for centuries, but also the progress being made towards a better future (the construction of a small dam for irrigation purposes).

The Lesson
Sometimes being the odd one out can be challenging, and leave you of unsure about where you fit in. The obvious truth however, is that we are all different. We each have different beliefs, personalities and perspectives.

Though we may be different, like the sunflower in a field of maize, we share the same soil, the same water, the same energy. We interact with and are molded by those around us. We may be separate in appearance, but connected by nature. For we each have something to add, and our individual oddity does not weaken us, but makes us stronger.

We become not a melting pot but a beautiful mosaic. Different people, different beliefs, different yearnings, different hopes, different dreams. - Jimmy Carter

Sunday, March 24, 2013

This is Africa



Traveling is a brutality. It forces you to trust strangers and to lose sight of all that familiar comfort of home and friends. You are constantly off balance. Nothing is yours except the essential things – air, sleep, dreams, the sea, the sky - Cesare Pavese

Finally the moment you've all been waiting for (I'm an optimist at heart), my first post ever from Haydom, and in fact from Africa.

As with many things in Africa, things happen at their own pace, a pace that can be very different to what you are used to. So after several days of no internet, we have finally got some resemblance of internet back in Tanzania, which has given me a brilliant opportunity to post.

The biggest challenge facing me right now, is how to condense all that has happened into a story, where you as the readers can comfortably reach the end. I hope that the stories I share will both be entertaining, but also impart some lessons I've learnt about traveling and working in Tanzania.

Arriving into Tanzania
Arriving into Dar es Salaam gave me my first lesson, into the pace at which Africa can operate. I waited nearly over an hour to get a visa at the airport (know doubt if any of my family are reading this they would be saying 'I told you so'). Consequently, my first point advice to any traveler to Tanzania is to try and get your visa in advance, it's not worth the wait at the other end.

With this delay in getting a visa and delays embarking the plane I actually ended up missing my booked flight from Dar es Salaam to Arusha with PrecisionAir. These flights were initially booked about a gap of about 2hrs.

Lesson 2: Book enough time between flights.

Of course you could argue that I'm largely to blame for not being better prepared.

However, because of this little mishap, I was more or less thrown straight into another aspect of Tanzanian culture; their friendliness and willing to help. I was helped by many different Tanzanians and eventually got a flight later that night to Arusha with FastJet. Sure there was money involved in this case, but just their approach was outwardly friendly and welcoming.

A quick comment on FastJet as I was supposed to originally fly Precision Air. FastJet provided a good flight to Arusha. The only discernible difference I could detect between FastJet and PrecisionAir is that more foreigners seemed to fly PrecisionAir.

I would like to provide a quick lesson on money in Tanzania, which I also learnt during this experience. They are both quite obvious, but I saw one American kick up a stink (Australian phrase to overally complain about something, where it's probably not necessary).

Lesson 3: If paying in $US expect to receive change in Tanzanian Shilling, often worse than official rates.

Lesson 4: In addition, to this if are going to use $US make sure you have small change (e.g. $1 bills) as many vendors won't accept larger notes. However, the larger notes do get better exchange rates.

Lesson 5: New $US bills get better exchange rates.

Getting to Haydom

Before I left Australia I had an initially planned to take the public landcruiser from Arusha to Haydom. Many of the visitors to Haydom do this and it is one of the most common transportation methods.

The down-side (as others have told me) is that it's a 5-6hr journey in a cramped bus, which has zero suspension and subsequently lots of sore buttocks.

I however, was very fortunate to score a last minute plane flight as a joiner (extra passenger on a chartered flight), with Mission Aviation Fellowship or MAF. The flight was an amazing experience and I got to truly see Africa for the first time during the day. One lake we flew over had so many flamingos all you could see from the sky was a mass of moving pink. That was alive both in movement and also colour.

Joiner Flights cost around $US35 a huge saving. Plus your supporting outreach flights.

On this flight, I met one of the nicest and generous families that I've ever encountered. And they are largely the inspiration for the opening quote, so they well and truly deserve a mention. The three team members of the Egenberg family that I met were Ark (Pallitive Care Doctor), Signe (Midwife turned researcher) and their son Lars (future army helicopter pilot). Signe is involved with setting up an initiative in Tanzania to improve maternal outcomes during labour.

And that's it from me for now with plenty more stories to come, especially featuring the Egenberg family.

Wednesday, March 20, 2013

Get Ready for Lift Off



Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines, sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover. – Mark Twain


I'm currently sitting in Brisbane Airport at 1:00am waiting for my flight. It's not the most exciting part of the journey, but every journey has to start somewhere.

And realistically this journey started some months ago, though I'm only setting off today. It took a lot of planning/communicating back and forth between Haydom Lutheran Hospital, myself and my medical school.

In all this time, I have yet to answer, why Haydom? Well there are a multitude of reasons, so to prevent myself developing RSI tonight I'm just going to focus on a few. And keep them short & sweet.

1. Experience frontline clinical medicine
2. Develop my skills, but give back to a community at the same time
3. Haydom seemed to have a friendly community and well managed hospital
4. Enjoy a holiday somewhere overseas before I graduate (as students we are relatively time-rich so I thought I would take advantage of it)
5. Climb Mt Kilimanjaro
6. Experience something new & exciting

Interestingly it's also given me an opportunity to try out the blogger for iOS app. Unfortunately I can't see how the posts translate to the desktop, but it's looking good so far on the mobile.

That's over and out for now. Expect the next post to be coming from Dar es salaam or Arusha in Tanzania.