Habari, good morning! It's 4am and I can't sleep, too excited about making a 3-day trip to the Masai later today :) So I'd better update you on what has been going on lately here.
Last weekend I had a stomach bug so I stayed home, made myself a soup and had a relaxing time. Naomi and Michelle were home so they took good care of me :) Here you see a splendid view of Mt. Kili at sunset.
On Monday we went to a clinic with all the ladies in our project:

After the clinic we went for a meeting at Union Cafe (the Chagga tribe grows a lovely Arabica coffee on the hills of the surrounding mountains and they have formed a cooperative to sell it). HHA offers us the possibility of speaking with a psychologist to prevent a breakdown: 'caring for the carers'.

On Tuesday we went to a clinic near the Pare Mountain, where Roger, our most experienced translator, was born. There were so many patients that we had to split in two groups and it was Lorraine's and Naomi's baptism of fire taking cases (in a chicken hut!) aided by Roger.
Anna and I stayed with Michelle, first inside the guest house, where we were welcomed with a delicious chai (tea) and chapatti, then we moved under a tree because it was too hot inside, until a storm chased us back into the house again...

Every time we go to a clinic we take something to eat for our patients, like bananas or chapatti. Many of them have had to walk a long distance to come to the clinic and have no money to buy three meals a day so you can see the smiles on their faces when we hand them in our 'goods'.
That's it for now, folks. Stay tuned to hear more about our trip to the Masai! If you want to read more, have a look at Naomi's blog. It's time for me to pack my bag. Kwaheri (bye)!

The other day Sophie commented  on my first blog that it looks like I’m on holidays and I had to chuckle. I must admit that, being my first time in sub-Saharan Africa, I was quite relieved to realize this is such a nice area to volunteer for a few months. Jeremy and Camilla Sherr, who run Homeopathy for Health in Africa, put a lot of effort to make it very comfortable for us here.

Last Mon 21 Jan we started a  2-week training before we can help patients on our own (or in pairs). From Mon to Thur we accompanied Jeremy, Camilla and Michelle to a different clinic every day. Our clinics are a room in a hospital, private practice or in someone’s home. We also make home visits for those who are so sick that can’t come see us at the clinics. 

So off we go in our old Land Cruiser in the morning (those back at home will smile at this) driving on paved and unpaved roads taking 7-8 people every time: 5 volunteers, 2 translators and Jeremy or Camilla. Those in the back seat (3rd row) have to watch not to bump their heads all the time on the ceiling.

When we arrive there are plenty of people waiting and many more come during the course of the day so we have to give them numbers at the beginning of the clinic if we want to limit the number of patients we see that day. The first day we saw about 18 patients with Jeremy and Michelle helped by taking 6 more cases outside the clinic under a tree, although she was feeling a bit ill. No need to tell you that by the time we are done around 5pm our brain is totally fried and there is no concentration left for anything… but we still need to cook, charge our laptops, check emails, write blogs ;) and shower before going to be around 9.30-10 and waking up the next day at 6am with the sun. if there is no electricity we sit cosily by candlelight and use our torches. I really admire how Jeremy & Camilla manage the project and a house with 3 kids, travel abroad for teaching, guide volunteers, etc!

We saw great cases in clinic (for the homeopaths: I especially liked cases of Bismuth, Carbo-veg, Opium, Plumbum, Coccus cacti - I have to study lots). If you look at the pictures below starting from upper left going clockwise: 1) Jeremy in clinic with Naomi, Lorraine and me. 2) A patient thanking us after HHA granted her a micro-loan (she is taking care of 11 orphans!), 3) a young lady with long-standing pneumonia (she got carbo-veg), 4) Camilla in clinic, 5) Naomi and me, 6)Michelle taking the case during a home visit (the lady got Opium, look how she's staring at the floor) and 7) one of our patients.

On Friday we had the luxury to follow a whole-day seminar with Jeremy at Melinda's, who has a beautiful place outside of Moshi and cooks fantastic organic food from her own garden. He tought us about how to recognize the most commonly prescribed remedies in AIDS cases. It was a relaxing day and we swam by the pool and had lunch under the trees. A few wild monkeys came close by when they smelled the food. Oh we really needed the break after the intense first week! See pic below...

Dear friends, I arrived safely at Kilimanjaro International Airport on the 19th of January after a 1-hr stop in Dar-as-Salaam. A very friendly taxi driver was there waiting for me to take me to Moshi, 40km from the airport. This is the view from my garden at Hahnemann House, where I am staying with another 4 female volunteers: Michelle from the USA, Lorraine and Naomi from the UK and Anna from Sweden. As you can see, we are at the foot of Mt. Kilimanjaro.

The house is really nice with a lovely garden around it. I share a room with Naomi. There is a guard and a 'house mother' that cleans and washes our clothes. We have electricity cuts sometimes so we charge our laptops, phones, batteries, cameras, etc (oh my, I hate cables!) whenever we can...

On Sunday 20 Jan we made a trip to a nearby waterfall and swam under it. On the way we played with a two-horned cameleon, heard some stories from our guide Isaac about the local Chagga tribe customs, went into a man-made cave where the Chagga hid from the colonisers, bought some fruit from children and women, had lunch under a canopy of flowers and admired the beautiful nature here. Next time I will tell you more about the clinics we are visiting and the work we are doing here. It's 10pm now, bedtime for me :) lala salama! (good night in Swahili).