Good bye to Nairobi
(This blog was writen in the air over Europe. Sorry it took so long to post it)
My plane has just taken off from Amsterdam. We are expecting to land 45 minutes ahead of schedule in New York. As we climb high in the air, I wanted to take some time and give you the highlights of my journey to Nairobi. The journey began with a 6 and a half hour flight to Amsterdam from JFK Airport. We arrived at 5:10 am, one and a half hours earlier than expected. The Airport was deserted except for the passengers from my plane. There were several duty free shops as well as a Casino and a Museum. I used the 5 hour layover to begin to write my book. I left Amsterdam at 10:15 AM on a new KLM 777 jet. This plane was huge. I was seated in row 54 and there were several rows of seats behind me. There were 10 seats across each row. They fed us every 2 hours on the flight into Nairobi. Fire trucks a band and Masai Warriors were there to greet us when we landed. The fire trucks christened the plane with their hoses shooting streams of water at Nairobi. . Upon arriving in Nairobi, I was struck by the contrast of airports. Amsterdam was new, modern, well lit and huge. Nairobi was small, dimly lit and slightly crowded. I completed a form declaring that I was vaccinated against Yellow Fever and then went through a line to have my passport verified. Dr. Nancy Cabelus and her driver, Purity, net me at the gate after I retrieved my luggage. We drove approximately 15 minutes to the diplomatic compound where Nancy lives. The roads were completely dark, no street lights of sidewalks. I described in an earlier post on this blog how beautiful Africa was from the air. I had a little over an hour of daylight to see Africa from the air. My first full day in Nairobi was spent going to a mall to get an African SIM card for my cell phone. I also need to get some Kenyan shillings as they do not use US dollars in Kenya. The exchange was 1 Shilling + $1.30 US dollars. $100.00 got me approximately 6700 shillings. We then went to Nancy’s country club for some exercise. We did the 5k walk around the golf course. This was my first experience with African wildlife. Monkeys were all over the golf course and our walking path. The people who were golfing ignored them. The monkeys ignored us. We had Tea at 6pm and then we headed back to the Riverside Park residence. Nodie Sullivan, a Nurse Practitioner from Seattle Washington was supposed to meet me in Amsterdam and we would fly into Nairobi together, but she missed her flight and did not join us until Sunday afternoon. My reason for coming to Nairobi was to assist in teaching health care staff from Nairobi National Hospital to become SAFE Examiners. The Country of Kenya had just written a draft of the new Sexual Offence Act. A task force was formed to update the older laws on the books. In Nairobi, this work would come under the title of Gender Based Violence. GBV is much larger that sexual violence. It also deals with violence perpetrated against a person because of their gender. Female Genital Mutilation (female circumcision) comes under this group of violence. The SOA is extremely important to the work to end GBV. I allows for Registered Nurse and Clinical Officers (similar to our Physicians) to perform forensic examinations of sexual assault patients as well as testify to their findings in court. The training was a wonderful experience. There were 24 women and 4 men in our class. They came from Accident and Emergency (what we call the Emergency Department) as well as pediatrics, critical care, Nurse Counseling, Psychiatry, and Orthopedics. They were RNs, Clinical Officers, Psychiatrists, OB/GYNs and Nurse Counselors. Our training was broken down into several major components. There was the Medical Day, the Psychosocial Day, the Forensic Day, the Legal Day, the Clinical Practicum and the Mock Trial. Mock trial was held in High Court. High Court in Kenya is analogous to the Supreme Court in the US. Court was on holiday and the Kenyan Attorney General gave us permission to use one of the courtrooms. Photographs of the entire training can be seen on my Face Book page. There was a written exam which consisted of 50 multiple choice questions. I am proud to say that everyone passed, which a major accomplishment is considering that English was the second language for all of the students. The Clinical Practicum was held over 3 days. Nodie and I each precepted 12 Examiners each day. Each Examiner completed 3 exams. We got volunteer patients by advertising a free women’s wellness exam. Each examiner had to complete some forensic evidence collection as well as a speculum exam and a Pap Smear. I also had to opportunity to visit the Giraffe Center, Kenya National Park, the Kazuri Bead Factory, the Massai Market and the home of artist Geraldine Robarts. On my last day, I visited a Colonel’s home and learned how to make homemade Beer and Bead Jewelry. Graduation was the most amazing experience of my life, to date. Dr. Cabelus, Nodie and I were each presented with Kenyan jewelry, a special cloth wrap called a K and a woven Kenyan pocketbook in our favorite colors. We were draped in the K and jewelry while all of the students sang and danced around us. We danced to, or at least we tried to. There were smiles, tears, laughing and cheering and it was caught on video, which I will also try to upload on Face Book. I learned that I like to drink tea in the afternoon. I learned that the Unites States is doing amazing research on HIV, Malaria and other infectious diseases. I learned that there are people from all over the world who come to different parts of Africa to assist the country in its efforts to improve the health care of its citizens. I also learned that violence, especially sexual violence is high in Nairobi and that it will take teamwork, diligence and commitment of funds to change the culture that allows it to continue. We, in the United States take a lot for granted. I witnessed a hospital in a city of over 3.6 million people provide comprehensive services on HIV, infectious diseases, maternal /child health issues, infertility, sexual offence (the British spelling) and child abuse; all on a shoe string budget. Going to Nairobi has changed the way I view health care and all that I too have taken for granted. I believe that we made history in Nairobi. We planted a seed that will grow into standardized care and services that will change the lives of millions of victims. In summary, my journey to Nairobi is something that I will never forget. I promised to return, and I truly hope that I get the opportunity to go back. The people of Kenya are kind, appreciative, extremely intelligent, and for the most part, very poor. They have a spirit and a willingness to help others. They want to learn. They want to make a change.
