New birth and other beginnings

Great excitement. On Monday Stepheni the gardener told us our chicken, Jet, had succeeded in hatching the eggs she had so carefully been sitting on for most of the last month. We are now the proud “grandparents” of two tiny chicks, beautifully soft and cute, but mottled brown and white rather than yellow. She is a very protective mother and won’t let the other hens, or us, anywhere near the chicks without a fight. It is lovely to watch her taking the food from the bowl and breaking it up into smaller parts for the chicks to eat, they rarely stray more than 20 cms away from her and nestle under her wings when she sits down. In addition there have been 6 eggs so the average cost per egg is now about £1.50 (28 eggs for £43) less the value of 2 chicks.

Irene’s Tanzanian name is Mama Davidi (Mother david - being our eldest son). She draws the line, however, at being called Bibi Cuku (Grandmother chicken)

Stepheni and Mama Asante were fascinated to see some photos of our grandson that Malcolm had been sent for Father’s Day. Particularly those taken at the zoo with exotic animals. In a country with elephants, monkeys, snakes, large spiders, multi coloured birds etc (all of which can be seen in this area now or in recent years) they were amazed to see……..Guinea Pigs. Still, they are native to South America rather than Europe which makes them quite exotic I suppose.

The rest of the week has passed pretty quietly. Malcolm went to Dodoma on Wednesday to discus the hospital’s repayments of debt owing to NSSF (about 100 million shillings!!! - enough to run the whole Hospital for 2 months. NSSF is similar to National Insurance. He wasn’t looking forward to it as he had just had a difficult telephone conversation with the area manager he was meeting, when she threatened to take him / the Hospital back to court. Fortunately the finances of the Hospital are slowly improving which means they managed to come to a reasonably amicable agreement (mainly that we agree that in a few weeks time we will agree the timescales for beginning to repay the debt, and pay something off in the meantime) and he still remains out of Tanzanian prison!

It is also almost the start of the beginning of a new financial year which means that he will need to carry out stock takes and prepare to finalise the accounts. The new accountant should join the Hospital on 1^st July so there will be a few months to hand over the work.

Building work is being completed at the Hospital. The new Nursery for premature babies has just been opened – the technology is simple with babies kept in baby baths rather than incubators, and the tiled room kept warm by a simple heater.. but it is a big improvement on the previous room which was unhygienic with mould on the walls because of the humidity. In addition a covered walkway is being built between the labour and maternity wards. Not so important at this time of year, but in the summer when the heavy monsoon rains come the last thing a woman in labour needs is a drowning as she is trolleyed between the wards!!!!!!! Talk about waters breaking! – more like the flood!!

Irene has returned to the filing office. Her ‘mission’ is to get additional shelving so that by the time we leave she will at least know there is enough space to store files for the foreseeable future – a mission she failed to achieve last year.

In the coming week:

- we meet with church leaders to distribute the second month’s ‘Hunger Fund;

- the new accountant starts on Wednesday

- stock taking and other end of year fun

Wet and dry chickens

A lovely, relaxing, long weekend on the beach at Kigamboni near Dar es Salaam was marred only by having to say goodbye to our good friend John Clark. He returned to England on Tuesday to go back to his work at Eton College where he will in principle be deputy head, although with a different title. Unfortunately they have been quarantined because of an outbreak of Swine Flu (which is quite ironic) - but he is fearless!! He has spent 3 years as head master of Mvumi secondary school and will be greatly missed by all. We spent a long time on the beach where we saw jellyfish, a camel and a herd of cows. Most of us went for a sail on a traditional fishing dhow and got absolutely drenched - Malcolm stayed behind to keep dry., justifying this as a non-swimmer, if the boat sank then he wouldn’t need saving putting others at risk!!! Chicken!!

(Talking of which, we have now had 6 more eggs. Over the weekend 4 were laid. We usually lets them out of their run into the fenced off garden for some exercise and “grub eating” but has found that they don’t lay when given this freedom. Obviously being kept in there small pen encourages laying, which may be an argument for factory eggs? The total so far is 22 eggs for £43 – less than £2 each!!!!!)

For our final meal with John we visited an unusual Ethiopian restaurant in Dar es Salaam where you end up eating your table cloth! Don’t worry it is made of dough and the food was excellent.

Whilst in Dar Malcolm spent a happy morning visiting shops to get copies of receipts to assist an audit investigation. He also visited the Ministry of Health to find out more about the grants the Hospital should receive – Irene and Co. spent the time on the beach

Returning to Mvumi we were pleased to see that Stumpy was still coming to sleep in the veranda and that our house hadn’t been broken into. Our Swahili teacher had sent us a text whilst we were away to say that her home had been robbed whist she was at church. For local people to be the victims of such crime illustrates the growing desperation in a community with poor crops. The money she had saved was to buy food so its loss will be a hardship.

At work Irene is continuing to tidy up the medical files. Malcolm is helping to sort out the medical stores ready for and end of year stock-take, and learning about the use of all sorts of medical equipment. The Hospital Matron, Rehema Sawe, has worked hard to get the stores into order over the past year and has introduced a basic but simple stores system - a great improvement over last year when, because of lack of space, the medical stores was a jumble of boxes in no particular order or system. It is even looking professional!!! Well done Rehema.

We think next week will be a ‘nothing special’ week – but we wait and see!!!!

Imagine……………………. and hard work

Just imagine you have heard that rabies has been found in your area, and that Hospital has been told to kill all dogs that stray into the grounds.

Imagine that in the village the way locals kill a suspect dog is far from quick and humane as they only have stones for weapons, and you’re not sure how the hospital plan to cull theirs. You feel that this is a false alarm, an unnecessary panic as although someone may have been bitten no one has suffered from more than the actual bite and no actual case of rabies has been confirmed; but you certainly wouldn’t want the risk of anyone getting bitten by a rabid dog. Imagine that as you hear this report an affectionate, loyal, friendly but determinedly free willed, old hospital dog called Stumpy is sleeping in your veranda. What do you do?

I certainly wish that imagining that scenario was all we had to do this week but unfortunately it actually happened. What did we do about Stumpy? Well, we let him stay in the veranda all night and then in the morning, much against his will, we put him in our fenced off garden, fed and watered him and hoped he would settle down happily for a few days until the panic was over. Two minutes latter he disappeared into the village; Houdini couldn’t have done a better job! He still returns in the morning and goes out at night. It’s as if he realises all the other dogs from the Hospital have disappeared and he is safer in the veranda during the day.

During the week Malcolm attended two important meetings. On Tuesday he sat on the interview panel for the hospitals new accountant. (Such is the prevalence of “Chinese whispers” here that a rumour immediately went round the hospital saying he had left, presumably they thought HE was having an interview!) After a long day the vacancy was offered to a promising and young candidate so hopefully when Malcolm leaves Mvumi there will be someone to carry on the work.

On Wednesday there was the first Board Meeting for the new Designated District Hospital, chaired by the Bishop and attended by representatives of the District Council. The meeting went well although the Principals of the Training schools would not be happy as they were instructed by the Bishop to manage the deductions of Income Tax from their allowances properly.

It was also the end of an era for Mvumi. John Clark, Headmaster of the Secondary School, returns to his job at Eton College next week and so it was a time for farewell, On Thursday the remaining ‘Mzungus’ (us, Dr. Corrie and Julia) had a last supper with John and two gap year students. A present for him was a video of John’s time in Mvumi, part of which covering the Secondary School has been posted on Youtube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7MEu6_8bh6I&feature=channel

or search for thecrawfordclan.

We shall certainly miss him – but not just yet. On Friday we join him for a trip to Dar es Salaam, for a break on the beach before he flies to good old blighty on Tuesday.

For next week:

- we have a nice break in Dar es Salaam after a busy week in Mvumi

- Malcolm spends a day in Dar seeking evidence of a potential fraud and visiting the Ministry of Health

PS – cost of eggs update. No more cost, but no more eggs either!!! So still £43 for 16 eggs. Maybe they are roasters … they have been warned

A wee bit of Scottish Culture, at last!!!

Last weekend saw us go to the 50^th birthday party for Carol (someone we know from Dodoma) , who wanted to have a Ceilidh. Malcolm even had his hair cut for the event!!!! So you would have seen us energetically Scottish dancing in an aircraft hanger owned by MAF in Dodoma, surrounded by airplanes and other bits of engineering. Well at least Malcolm was dancing a bit energetically; Irene found her dodgy knee didn’t quite take to the reels. However, because the music was recorded and there was not an experienced caller, part way through to everyone’s delight she decided she could do better and took over, and began calling the dances. This is the first time she has ever, ever done this with adults - maybe a new career beckons! The next day we followed this by attending the English speaking service in the cathedral where we joined Corrie as the music group. There’s no such thing as taking a back seat here.

During the week we were invited for a meal to Mama Asantes house. Her door frame had recently collapsed. However, that didn’t stop the invite. Unlike some of the houses we have been invited to, Mama Asante’s house doesn’t have smooth floors and painted walls but is a simple construction of mud bricks with rough walls and floor. However the welcome couldn’t have been warmer and we were treated to meat and rice which would have been quite an expense for her and she would have saved up over many weeks. During the evening we discovered that she was down to her last bucket of maize. We had given her a salary advance when we arrived which should have provided her with adequate food. However, we believe that, as is the culture here, when one person has some food or money they are expected to share this with friends or other members of the family, so her money will have gone, Because her husband suffers from epilepsy they survive on what we pay for part time work (about £16 per month) and growing tomatoes. A bucket of maize costs £4 and lasts about 3 weeks (if no family come to visit). They have no money to buy any more. And yet, because she has a job they would probably not be regarded as desperate enough to deserve a share of the Hunger Fund we distributed last week.

At work it was decided that next Wednesday the Hospital DDH Governing Board will meet. This is the first meeting since the Hospital became a Designated District Hospital. Malcolm is therefore desperately putting together a report on the financial position and preparing a budget. It will be interesting to see how the meeting develops, and what other information will be discussed.

There will also be interviews next week for a new accountant and administrator. Malcolm visited the Diocese General Secretary in Dodoma to discuss arrangements for the interviews and to prepare questions. If successful it will mean the Hospital will have its first full-time accountant for over 18 months. Bizarrely, whilst at the Diocese HQ Malcolm met the former accountant who had left under a cloud taking with him all the financial records.

The egg saga continues. We were quite impressed as last weekend the chickens had produced 4 eggs in 2 days; this means that two chickens must have been laying. However Jet has become broody and we have decided to let her keep 2 eggs to sit on and hopefully hatch. Since then only 1 other egg has appeared in 5 days! We cant decide if this is because Jet is now hogging the communal nest or whether its because their food has run a bit low. Malcolm has just managed to bring a large sack of chicken food back from his trip to Dodoma so maybe that will encourage them again. Total cost is now £43 for 16 eggs - £2.70 each.

Next week:

- Interviews for a new accountant on Tuesday

- First DDH Health Board on Wednesday

- John Clark, secondary school headmaster, returns to Eton College on Friday

- Will the cost of eggs drop???? Will any more eggs drop????