Mambo, Tanzania ...

We arrived at Kilimanjaro Airport at 1:30 am on February 27th and were met as promised by the staff of the Tanzania Volunteer Experience (TVE), what a dedicated group they are! We had offered to get a hotel for our first night, but there isn't much around Kili Airport, and Jessica the placement coordinator and Michael the driver took us to the volunteer house about an hour away for our first night's stay. TVE is a local organization which has partnered with International Volunteer Headquarters (IVHQ) to provide lodging and volunteer placement.

The volunteer house is very nice, but I immediately looked around for bugs (bad idea) and found a huge (like three inches) black something, and had to practice my Yoga breathing to relax enough to get to sleep. Pat loves bugs, so slept like a baby.

The next morning Michael drove us to our home stay, which is very nice and there are two little girls living there who are about 5 years old. One goes to school, one doesn't, which is the challenge here as even if school is supported by the government, parents must buy books and uniforms and supplies so many children still don't attend. TVE has volunteers in many orphanages here, which are really more like schools and daycares for children who have lost their parents to AIDS, or whose parents cannot afford to feed and care for them during the day.

Pat and I will be doing medical visits to as many of these orphanages as we can, to do physical exams and some health teaching at each site. We visited a site yesterday, and today we have been buying supplies to put together first aid kits to bring them. We will be taking the local "daladalas" to the sites - these are vans with about 8 seats in them, but they cram 20-30 people in them, so please keep the prayers coming that we don't fall off one of them.

The people here so far are beautiful, very friendly, and understanding of our newness to the culture. The weather is warm and sunny, and we are looking forward to our first "rotating medical clinic" tomorrow.