Updates from Africa – January 25

Sister Toni spoke by phone with Dr. Sherry Teefey and Theresa Suessen, who are at the Entebbe airport.  They are both reflecting on the amazing experience they have had, expanding the safe birth project, interacting with mothers-to-be, and meeting with the midwives.  Theresa reported that the experience was not good at all.  It was WONDERFUL!!!  The drive from Masaka to Entebbe was slow but steady–a torrential rain accompanied them most of the way.  This weather is most unusual, but much needed, for this time in January, and the group said that they must be rainmakers indeed.

For the group in Nairobi, today started with a flight from the smaller Wilson Airport into the Maasai Mara to the Little Governor’s Camp, a permanent tented camp just across the Mara River.  The birds–the birds!!!  On the way to make this call, Julie G spotted a warthog meandering between the tents.

On the game drive, Sister Toni, Sister Barb, Julie S, and Julie G spotted three male lions, too many female lions to count, and a 3-month-old lion cub that was playing in the savannah.

The terrain is breathtaking.  The flora is stark and wild and vivid.  The fauna are abundant–there are Thompsons gazelles, other gazelles, giraffes, elephants, cape buffaloes.  Their guide told them to be on the lookout for an elephant they call “Blossom,” because she likes to eat the flowers near the tents.

The noises–animal grunts, bird calls, wind whistles–are drastically different from the horn honking, brake squeals, and metropolitan accumulation of electronic noise in the vast city.

This is a chance to reflect on all the experiences of the past several days.  The joys of celebrating pass-ons of cows and pigs, the jubilant dancing with the women of BUWEA, and the heartaches and dreams of the people in desperately poor situations in the crannies and slums of Nairobi–all gifts of being present in the moment for the group.