Chapter 2 Arusha National Park Mental Sanity

Chapter 2 Arusha National Park

As many of my friends know, my mental health therapy in Moshi was not alcohol entirely, but Arusha National Park. Here is a little park that is small, loaded with giraffe and colobus monkeys, and interesting lakes and trees. Since John’s colleague Sarah had virtually no time to go on a safari, we managed to hire Carol to take us to the park.

Life always has to have dramas and ours was when Carol reminded us just as we entered the park that we had to pay with Visa Card or as a last resort USD and neither of us had a card with us. We had carefully counted out our Tshillings and happily set off. The hot flashes were steady with me as we waited for Carol to negotiate our entrance. Not surprisingly, Carol persuaded our way in and of course it was a wonderful day. The grass was so high, it was hard to see the animals, but they were there and we found the Colobus, Ververt monkeys, ngiri, twiga, buffalo, and the flamingos—wow the flamingos! I had never seen so many in my life.






We ate lunch at the regular spot, wind whipping around and the flamingos moving all around us on the Big Momella lake. It was amazing. There was a new way to the Fig tree, thank you for the loan of your car Jan (don’t worry we cleaned it before we left), and we forded the river at a crazy diagonal, but easier than in previous trips. It allowed us to see a few more birds and buffalo as we drove up through the world of the “Lord of the Ring” forest until we came to the fig tree. Here is something that doesn’t change. You have to stand or sit on a car to show the height and uniqueness of the fig. (has anyone been to Sequoia National Park and is the big Red drive through Sequoia still there?



On this trip, we were racing, thus no leisurely exit from the park to look for more giraffe or warthogs but hurrying out and back through the crowded Arusha Road to once again arrive for a dinner planned to visit with our friends. I thought about all the other times in which some group or others of us said, “ I am going nuts, let’s go to Arusha!” It is a park rich in memories. Maybe the mountain will come out and we can see it right behind a giraffe. Maybe someone will remind us of Hatari, the movie (mostly Nicoli), and we get a good laugh.

Chapter 1 Moshi, Tanzania A Land of Love, A Land of Beauty, A Land of Poverty, A Land of Hope

Moshi A Land of Love, A Land of Beauty, A Land of Poverty, A Land of Hope
Chapter 1

This trip to Africa was brief. Two weeks consistied of making every moment count towards seeing old friends, catching up with things going on in the project and trying to keep out of making promises that cannot be kept. It was a time of wishing that I knew some information, and sorry that I know too much information. It as a time of feeing humbled by the number of friends who we have come to know in Moshitown, and by wishing that we had more right or better answers for the problems that have befallen so many of the people we have come to love. It was a time of feeling conflicted about many many things. And, yet it was home. How is it possible to describe the way it feels to wake up at 6:15 am hearing the African birds chatting away each and every day, to know that it is warmer at 6:30 than it will be at 9:00 am, or that today there will be rain when it looks the same way tomorrow and you somehow know there won’t be rain. How hearing the voices on the road during the morning and the singing at night (when it is Mambo Sawa Sawa) is part and parcel of this place you call home. Our old pal Barney, Russel and Kay's, and then the Wilkerson's old boxer, looked so lost and then the new German family moved in and he is up wagging his tail and looking just as happy as can be. A more adaptable boy I will never know.
The sweet black and orange kitties who decided A-5 would be better than B8 until Jean came home, and I helped them migrate back to B8 with full cream!
It is avocado time in Moshitown. 4-5 a day fall from the tree. "Mind your head!" They are so good. An avocado a day does what? Keeps your HDL high.


Our Gardener Pauli has decided to make shapes out of our bushes, and his topiary have included a small table as you see with teapot and cup, and a seat (just like on the porch) and another bigger table in the back yard with chairs all around it. It is a little more abstract I have to say.
This feeling in no way belittles the feeling of being in Durham or Boone, but it is a different feeling, deep and content. To walk around the yard, pick some lettuce, look at the flowers, feel the grass, saunter over to B8 for a beer in the afternoon. To go downtown and spend 30 minutes chatting with the hardware store owner about this and that, to hear about his health and to have his son chime in and then to walk out and to see smiles on the faces of other friends in downtown Moshi. These are people we would never come to know in the US, but here in Moshi, it is just part of life.
This is my sweet daughter Cipe from Moshi, in her last months of pregnancy, and Sarah, John's Duke colleague.
One day after flying into Moshi and being picked up by our dear driver and friend Carol (with yet again no bags) we grabbed some clothes, ran down to Aleems for food, and headed for a hash to West Kilimanjaro. This is an area that you don’t often go to. It is a land of plains, hills, big farms, Maasai, wealth and poverty. Thanks to Sarah and Kermin, we ran or walked these hills, following flour prints in the sand and scree and gravel until the little Masaii boys had ground it out with their bare feet. Their joy at giving us opposite directions was equally met with our confusion and a little frustration. But this is a hash and people wiping out the flour marks are just part of the game. It was all-ok. As Simon said, this is the most beautiful land in the world (if it just had rain!) And that of course makes all the difference. We walked by Masaii bomas where the mamas looked suspiciously at us but hoped that we would want to take their picture so that they could collect just a little money from these strange wazungus (crazy white people). But they greeted us if we shikamooed them, and Simon greeted each in Ki-Masaii and was solemnly greeted back.
The decorated Masaai with jewelry and bright checked cloth were rare on this hash because they were working in their boma, and not headed out to town or to visit with other bomas. But, each had at least one checked cloth tossed over their shoulder, and the children pushed their goats and cattle along looking for a small patch of grass, each laughing and calling at these strange people. Nicoli found treasures everywhere, rocks, special plants that needed his pocket knife. He doesn’t speak Ki-Masaai but does Swahili so he would give a little greeting to the boys who were shocked at this little mzungus who spoke Swahili fluently. Nicoli watching everything on the ground for treasures.

Masaai were actually and are actually everywhere in West Kilimanjaro. They consider it their land, and actually consider that all land is theirs if they are there. The farmers have a difficult time because they lose cattle to the Masaai, but the Masaai don’t find this a dilemna because if the cow wandered a way and agreed to join their herd, then it was part of their herd. Work this out if you are the land owner. The immense poverty in the culture of Masaai is one of the curiosities to me. This is their life, at least for most. And as we ran buy or walked by, we all talked about it, most in disparaging ways. Why? Well, it is a very different culture than ours. Concepts of ownership and wealth are totally different, belief in other forms of medicine, gender, children, all are pretty difficult for Westerners, and even other tribes in the Northern Zone.

But, the Beauty was all around, and the Masaai share in our love of the beauty, too. We are linked. I just digressed I guess. some beautiful flowers
happy hashers
The hash was the last for Liselotte and Martin. These two had been hashing for 6-8 years. (Liselotte and Martin) Amazing. And now they are “the leavers”, too. Both leave a huge imprint in the story of expats in Moshi, and it is hard to imagine that they will soon be gone to Malawi where they will start their own imprint. What defined this couple? Hard to exactly know as they at first glance are pretty different. Liselotte- music, determination, seemingly easy going. Martin- seemingly very easy going, crazy, just on the edge…. Such a part of the Moshi that John and I knew and will miss when we return.

It is also one of the last hashes for Sarah and Kermin. When I think of fun, I think of Sarah. Two more of the –oh well when we go to Moshi, we will drop in on Sarah and of course see Kermin. Sarah the hot Irish entrepreneur with Hostlehoff who put ingenuity to work and managed to start some girls’ programs, built an orphanage, mothered lost travelers, and could put just a few folks down the drain when it came to whiskey. Now the hole will be in our hearts when we travel back to Moshi and find them gone!

Because of my bad back, Greg had arranged that we spend the night on a big farm in a little guest house that had a lovely view. Since we had been drinking, eating tons of nyma choma (barbecue) breakfast and tour in the morning.
I felt like we were in a movie about the hard life on a huge farm in Montana, or oh yes, Africa. These were impressively hard working people, and all the kids are expected to work hard as well. Farm animals

Vienna in and around

Our trip to Vienna on the way to Moshi seems so long ago now. We had made many preparations, including 4 overweight bags for KIWAKKUKI and just a few clothes for our selves. But, we were ready. The trip began in Durham but quickly ground to a halt in Detroit as our plane had mechanical difficulties and we were grounded for two hours. Of course this meant that we would miss the Vienna flight. Because two major events were coinciding in Vienna, the World AIDS Conference (25,000 people) and the Life Ball, an annual event of the glitterati to raise money for AIDS in Austria and for the Global Fund, (@3,000 people) there were no seats on any flights directly to Vienna. This meant that we had to go to Vienna via Strasbourg and make a 45 minute connection to get to Vienna. Though we made it, sadly our bags did not. Strangely 3 bags (all for KIWAKKUKI) seemed to arrive from Kampala just as we were reporting our bags lost. There was general confusion and we spent our first night with KIWAKKUKI T-shirts on, wondering how long we would be in our dirty jeans.

Fortunately our last bag arrived the following morning. We stayed in the Regina Hotel, a very old and quaint hotel conveniently located to the subway, and also next to the Votive Church (built by Marie Theresia after Franz Joseph (which one?) was nearly murdered, and she built it when he survived.

Also coincidently, the hotel was right next to the Freud Park, the University where he taught, and his house, complete with funny ancient videos made by Anna Freud and THE COUCH! I love to poke around and this time my poking came in handy because the Freud Museum was close, but not where the guidebook described.
(Freud House)
Since John had a meeting when we first arrived, I was free to hop on and hop off the bus to acquaint myself with downtown Vienna. It was lots of fun, though extraordinarily hot. It would be hard to name highlights because so much is packed into a very small area. Clearly it felt amazing to be on the street where Mozart lived, where he wrote the Requiem shortly before his death, and where he and his wife were married (St. Stephen’s fabulous church).
(on square where St. Stephens Church is located--Mozarts were everywhere)
Vienna a beautiful City
I discovered that Otto Wagner (related to Richard) was very active in architecture and put his hand to tons of different things including the modern art museum. I loved the Russian soldier statue, Parliament, the Belvedere Palace, the Hofburg Palace and the gardens.
(Russian Soldier Statue)
(Butterfly Museum next to Hofburg House)

(Big Hofburg House)
On our own, John and I went to the Central Cemetery and found where the great masters of music are buried, and where a statue of Mozart resides as no one knows the location of his remains.
(Schubert)
(Beethoven)
(Brahms) (Mozart statue) (Strauss)

The Life Ball was an amazing thing to behold from the outside. John and I naively thought that we might be able to get tickets to this event since we were attending the conference. We had no idea that probably the cost to get inside was well over $1000/ticket or that it had been sold out months in advance and only the rich and famous are privy to these tickets. But we certainly watched the show until the lightening started. The outdoor festivities were over as soon as the rain poured down as the amount of electrical equipment was enough to probably blow up the city. But the costumes were fun enough.



On our last day, we went to see Cossi Fan Tutti at the SchÖnbrunn Palace and Gardens…There, too were stories of interest. All about Franz Joseph (the what?) dancing with Marie Antoinette (which one?) and falling in love, marrying her, bringing her to Vienna where she was unhappy and returned to Paris, and he took to walking with his “good friend” another woman with whom he had breakfast with each morning and then they walked around the gardens. Uh huh… The opera was great actually and in a lovely small setting. Unfortunately as it got darker and the spotlights came on so did horrible bugs (wadudu) and were totally eating us alive and landing everywhere. I managed to slide as close to John who was out of the light, but one elderly (not me) lady in front of me had about 200 of them making a nest on her shirt collar. It was totally gross and you couldn’t help but stare. At least it came at the end of the opera.

I have reported on the conference on the previous blog so I won't add more to it! But now we are near our last days in Moshi, and the entire Vienna trip seems like a dream. Wow. I wish we had had time for a little trip down the Danube. The old Danube looked lovely, the new Danube looked like a sewer.

World AIDS Day Coverage, my perspective

DAYS OF UPS AND DOWNS THE WORLD AIDS CONFERENCE

I HAVE SKIPPED THE MARCH AND THE SERVICE OF HEALING BECAUSE I SO WANTED TO GET THE GREAT NEWS OUT AND THE UPDATE WITH MY HOPEFUL U-TUBE VIDEO, ALL OF WHICH HAVE TAKEN ME MUCH LONGER TO EDIT HORRIBLY, AND TO TRY TO MOVE OVER TO JOHN’S COMPUTER, AND TO CONTEMPLATE THE LAST FEW DAYS.

VIENNA IS SUCH A BEAUTIFUL COUNTRY, AND GENERALLY A VERY FRIENDLY ONE. BUT, AS WE WATCH PRESENTATION AFTER PRESENTATION FROM SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA, AND PONDER THE EFFECTS OF COLONIALISM ON THIS BEAUTIFUL CONTINENT, WE HAVE TO THINK ABOUT WHAT HELPED TO CONTRIBUTE TO THE DEVESTATION OF PERSONS THERE FROM HIV/AIDS. AND, THEN WE HAVE TO MOVE ON TO THINK ABOUT GENDER ISSUES, AND THE WHOLE ISSUE OF CRIMINALIZATION OF ADDICTION, A SICKNESS IF YOU WILL, THAT ANY ONE OF US MIGHT HAVE.

WE HAVE WATCHED SOME AMAZING NEWS AND PRESENTATIONS, MOSTLY FROM THE WEST (OR NORTH), LOOKING AT WHAT WE KNOW ABOUT THE VIRUS. GREAT PRESENTATION FROM TONY FAUCI WHO BROKE DOWN THE WHOLE ISSUE OF VIRUS AND HOW IT SPREADS AND WHAT WE CAN AND ALREADY HAVE DONE TO PREVENT IT’S GETTING INTO THE BODY. EVEN I COULD UNDERSTAND MOST OF IT.

BUT ALMOST IMMEDIATELY AFTER EACH PIECE OF GOOD NEWS WAS SOME WELL PRESENTED, RESEARCHED AND PREPARED PRESENTATION OF HORRIBLE PROPORTIONS ABOUT LACK OF CARE, LACK OF ACCESS TO CARE OR MEDICATIONS, SUB-TREATMENT, AND MOST DIFFICULT, OF GENDER VIOLENCE.

WHEN I HEAR CRITICISMS OF “FOCUS ON AFRICA” OR EVEN WORSE, “FOCUS ON WOMEN”, I CRINGE WHEN I HEAR THESE PRESENTATIONS AND THESE STATISITCS REGARDING VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN AND GIRLS. DO 10 YEAR OLD GIRLS REALLY CRAVE, WANT AND DESIRE TO HAVE SEXUAL INTERCOURSE WITH 29 YEAR OLD MEN? MY HOUSEKEEPERS DAUGHTER IS 10, AND IT SEEMS TO ME THAT SHE IS MOST INTERESTED IN PLAYING WITH BALLS, DOLLS, AND WHATEVER BOOKS I BRING TO MOSHI YEAR AFTER YEAR. WE TALK TO HER ABOUT THE DANGERS OF MEN, AND SHE IS FULLY AWARE AND TAKES BACK ROADS TO SCHOOL AS SHE WALKS EACH MORNING, IN ORDER TO AVOID THE FANCY CARS WHO ARE ALWAYS MOVING UP AND DOWN LEMA ROAD LOOKING AT THE PRETTY LITTLE GIRLS WHO WALK TO SCHOOL. SO, I REASONABLY SURE THAT THESE 10 YEAR OLD GIRLS ARE NOT INTERESTED IN BEGINNING THEIR SEXUAL ACTIVITY AT THIS TIME. THEY MIGHT WANT A SODA, A BRACELET, A DOLL, A PRETTY PAIR OF SHOES….BUT NOT WHAT COMES WITH SEX. AND DO WIVES REALLY WANT TO BE BEATEN? HOW CAN THAT BE? AND IF IN FACT MARRIAGE IS A RISK FACTOR FOR BECOMING HIV-INFECTED, WHATEVER WOULD CAUSE A WOMAN TO BE MARRIED. YET, ISN’T THAT WHAT MANY WOMEN STRIVE FOR? BECAUSE I HAVE A WONDERFUL, STABLE MARRIAGE WITH NO VIOLENCE, CAN I EXTRAPOLATE MY MARRIAGE TO ANYONE ELSES AND BELIEVE THAT THE WOMAN IS AT FAULT????

THE NEW MINISTER OF HEALTH IN SOUTH AFRICA HAS BEEN PRESENT ALL DAY EVERY DAY SPEAKING ABOUT SOUTH AFRICA’S DEDICATION TO UNIVERSAL ACCESS. WOW, WHAT A CHANGE. AND ERIC GOOSBY, OUR OWN PEPFAR DIRECTOR IS SO CLEARLY ON POINT. HE IS LIKE OBAMA. HE IS SO INTELLECTUAL, AND UNDERSTANDS THE ISSUES SO WELL, THAT, WELL, WE NEED TO JUST KEEP TALKING TO HIM. FOR ALL THE ACTIVISM IN MY HEART, I HEAR HIM AND BELIEVE HIM, AND I BELIEVE THAT OBAMA CARES AND BELIEVES. IN ONE VOICE HE TALKS ABOUT HILLARY, AND INDEED BILL CLINTON HAS BEEN HERE FOR THE LAST 3 DAYS TALKING UNTIL HE IS ONCE AGAIN CRACKING UNDER THE STRAIN. THEY ARE THINKING IN DIFFERENT WAYS. HOW CAN THE MONEY COME, AND HOW CAN IT COME MOST EASILY WITH THE NEW TEA PARTY LOVERS. PONDER.

OH DEAR. WHAT IS IT IN MY HEART THAT WRENCHES WHEN I HEAR THAT 33% OF CHILDREN IN A CLINIC IN UGANDA DIED WHILE THEY WAITED FOR ARV’S BECAUSE THEY WERE TOO OLD TO BE CONSIDERED IN THE UNIVERSAL TREATMENT PROGRAM. (< 1) I JUST CANNOT ACCEPT THAT THIS IS FAIR. I HAVE A GRADDAUGHTER WHO IS 15 MONTHS OLD. HOW COULD SHE BE DENIED MEDICATION BECAUSE SOMEHOW SHE WAS TOOOO OLD? NO.

BUT THEN THE NEWS OF THE DAY. HERE I WILL TRY TO ADD A U-TUBE. IT IS AMAZING. THE FIRST MICROBICIDE TRIAL IS LOOKING VERY PROMISING. NEARLY 50% OF THE PEOPLE WHO ENROLLED WERE PREVENTED FROM BECOMING HIV INFECTED. THESE WERE WOMEN IN KWA ZULU NATAL WHO ARE 51% HIV INFECTED BY THE TIME THAT THEY ARE 20! SO, IF WE CAN BEGIN TO PREVENT INFECTION THROUGH WOMEN’S CONTROL, A MICROBICIDE, WE HAVE ENTERED THE DREAMLAND THAT WE HAVE BEEN TALKING ABOUT FOR THE PAST 10 YEARS. LET US HOPE FOR THE BEST.

WITH THAT SAID, I HAVE BEEN MOVED BY BRAHMS’ IN THE CEMETARY, AND LOOKING FORWARD TO COSSI FAN TUTTI OUTDOORS.

WEEPING, LAUGHING CHEERING. HOPE. WOW.

A PS on the Wow...I have to cut my utube video of the great study. Check it out in the latest Science Magazine, or any thing on line about CAPRISA004. We saw the release on BBC last night. Amazing, and I will try to get some live footage by tomorrow.