So much going on we need to play catch-up:

I travelled to Nairobi with the Head of Human Resources from the Ministry last month, for a flying visit (less than 24 hours). We went to meet representatives from AMREF, a prominent African Health NGO that was founded in the fifties by some British medics who first introduced the “Flying Doctors” across Africa. In recent years they have developed and implemented an e-learning programme for upgrading nurses from certificate level to diploma level while they’re still in post, and they’ve already managed to get an impressive 4500 nurses through the course over the last couple of years – I need to mention that many of these students will have never come near a PC in their life before, a situation we will be facing with our in-service learners, too. Anyway, turns out we could have stayed closer to home (their Dar es Salaam office that is) because AMREF are currently supporting the Tanzanian mainland Ministry of Health and Nursing Council in setting up the same kind of programme. Hopefully we’ll be able to piggy-back on that initiative here in Zanzibar. Just in case you were wondering: Although Zanzibar is a part of Tanzania it is autonomous enough to have its own separate Ministry of Health. Hopefully we can support our colleagues in building stronger ties with the mainland ministry.

Nairobi: Just some random impressions of my short stay (obviously very limited and I’m aware I may not be fair to the place – some of you know it well and may want to paint a different picture):

• Never been to a place with so much pollution from cars before. Five minutes of walking along a main road and you just want to get back inside, because your throat is sore and you are gasping for air
• Stark contrast to laid-back Zanzibar where I always have to pace myself because I am moving three times faster than anyone else around me: Reems and reems of people marching along the roads at quite a pace to get home or to work, with probably several  miles to go – even at 5:30 in the morning on our way back to the airport
• Very professional and service-oriented set-up at AMREF (and very sharply dressed, business-like people!), quite an unexpected experience
• The little guest house, a bit like a Bed and Breakfast, in one of the closed off compounds seemed oddly British to me: From the set-up of the house to little things like door handles, to wardrobes, to faucets on the washbasins and the flush on the toilet, even the temperatures were a lot closer to a British summer than anything we’ve experienced out here – a bit mind-boggling the whole thing).

Anyway, next came John’s birthday – the birthday surprise being a pack of German Werthers Echte sweets from Nairobi airport. They turned out to be quite different from the ones he liked in Berlin but he was good about it just like he was good about enjoying the  lemon cake I had baked without scales or a mixer, or a zest grater..….

And next we were a part of our College’s graduation ceremony. Ah, if only our Kiswahili were better to understand all the speeches and made-up songs about the teachers! But at least it was a very colour- and cheerful affair that stimulated various senses. A really nice mixture of formality and happy partying:

The band

The Minister himself

The Minister of Health himself holding a speech and then handing out the certificates! This made me think the Free University of Berlin has a lot to learn about how to send its graduates off, somewhere from the back of my mind I can retrieve the non-experience of just walking into a grey, uninviting office building, being handed a piece of paper, accompanied by an uninspired and uninspiring “Herzlichen Glückwunsch” and that was it….

A hippocratic oath of sorts

Final dance and song

A really uplifting Saturday morning.

And here’s to good timekeeping after starting the event 90 minutes late: They finished the final song bang on the nose, 10 seconds and the Imam (no flexibility on that front) kicked in with his call to lunchtime prayer – we were so impressed…