I am back at home, or atleast in one of my homes. (I like to consider Italy my other home)
We made it through all 4 legs of our travel-from Nashville to Dallas to Dubai to Nairobi and then the drive to Tenwek. All went really smoothly...got our bags all here safely and navigated through the newly pieced together airport after the recent fire. And no issues in Nairobi.
No matter how many times I get to make the drive from Nairobi to Tenwek I am struck by several things...first the immense beauty in this country. We drive through the Great Rift Valley, which is quite amazing, but the countryside otherwise is spectacular. I am also struck by the normalcy of life here and how different that is from our life. As we drive we see children running to and from school in their uniforms and knee socks, we see donkeys driving carts full of some type of commodity, we see many many people walking down the dusty roads, people out on the side of the road selling buckets of potatoes or roasted corn. The worlds are so different, yet every person I meet or even just catching strangers' eyes there is so much joy and hope lying beneath. This hits me each year I am here and this year is no different.
The internet is being poky so I can't get any pictures uploaded. Maybe tomorrow...
We will spend tomorrow unpacking and organizing the ICU.
Oh and I have to brag on our Kenyan nurses. We walked into the ICU this afternoon and they had done three adult mitral valve repair cases this week-all of which were still in the ICU (they have been doing these since we left last year). All three patients were out of bed sitting up with a nurse at their side...doing things like incentive spirometry or getting vitals. I felt like a proud Mom! It is so unbelievable to see how much growth and learning has happened here since we started this project in 2008.
More tomorrow hopefully
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