First, some background. My mother in law, Bernice Lalley, gave me a St. Christopher medal for our trip. Now I wasn't raised Catholic, and attended the uber-Lutheran St. Olaf College, so medals aren't part of my religious upbringing. But Bernice is probably the most devout person I know, so when she gives me a medal which she has had blessed for a safe journey, I don't question it. And along the way, we have had some unusually close calls (ie earthquake, cyclone) and I have just rubbed my medal and we've made it through.
So a week ago, we were standing at the dala dala station trying to catch a bus home at the busiest time, and having no luck at all. People just pushed right past us, and we were getting close to dark, and we have been told not to take the dala dalas after dark for safety reasons. So Pat says "you'd better start rubbing your St. Christopher", which I had already been doing, and this nice young man leans over and asks where we are trying to go; we said "Ngaramtoni", and he says "I'm going to Ngaramtoni, just wait here with me and I'll get you on". So a few minutes later he guided us onto a bus, and as we took off he turned around and said "My name is Emmanuel, I am a social worker in hospice and palliative care, where are you from?" Both Pat and I were amazed, and told him we had been trying for two weeks to find a hospice program in Arusha to visit, and couldn't believe our good fortune in meeting him. He invited us to visit his program, which is through the Lutheran Hospital in Arusha. We had already visited both branches of the Lutheran Hospital through our visits with kids at the orphanages and schools. Emmanuel suggested we call on Dr. Mark Jacobson, the director of the hospital in Arusha, to get permission to spend time with the hospice team.
We had heard of Dr. Jacobson through the international health volunteering conference we attended in September; he has been quite remarkable in building health infrastructure in Tanzania, so we looked forward to meeting him. But it wasn't until I was seated outside his office that the thought occurred to me that he might have gone to St. Olaf, or be related to Jeanie Jacobson, who graduated in nursing with me in 1976. So after we chatted a while, I asked him if he went to St. Olaf, and he said "No, but two of my sisters did" and sure enough, one of them was Jeanie. Mark and Jeanie were from Stillwater, so they knew my old roommate Sal Schuneman, so for a few minutes it seemed like a very small world indeed.
Dr. Jacobson suggested we contact another hospice/palliative care doc in Arusha, Dr. Kristopher Hartwig, who had tea with us later that day. And yes, he went to St. Olaf too.
So we spent a wonderful day with the hospice/palliative care team which Pat will say more about, and one of the nurses - Paulina - has been to the US visiting hospice programs with my friend Jeanie Jacobson Morrison, who is now a hospice nurse herself. Paulina is so much like I remember Jeanie - warm, engaging, always welcoming and supportive - that I spent the day remembering my time at St. Olaf and feeling grateful for the years I spent there.
So, I am a St. Christopher medal-carrying Lutheran married to a Catholic who now has great respect for the Lutheran College he's been making fun of all these years, as the Lutherans have been a great support to Tanzania.
Hakuna Matata!
