Battered and bruised, we arrived in Snake Park, a campsite outside of Arusha, for a five day hiatus while BiRT went through some necessary repairs. And it was boring. So of course we spent time at the camp bar.
Group shot L to R: Jase, Steffi, Me, Henry, Sonia, Drew, Mike:
Henry after one too many "Hot Rock Hurler":
Drew discovers a business not yet franchised in America:
Danny and Ian took off on their own for our next climbing destination, Lukenya, instead of waiting around, which, in retrospect, was a wise move. I was forced to entertain myself by either eating my weight in chocolate at an upscale sweet shop in Arusha, or watching feeding time for the crocodiles at Snake Park.
Yum, dinner!:
Drew plays chicken:
The campsite also had a large exhibition area full of poisonous snakes which was somewhat entertaining, again during feeding time. I got to see a downy chick take on a black mamba and win. Or maybe the most poisonous snake on Earth was not particularly hungry at that time. Regardless, I chose to believe that when confronted by a black mamba, pecking it squarely on the head between the eyes would allow me to survive another day. If only I had a beak.
I also accompanied Sonia, a doctor from England on the trip, to a local free clinic that is primarily supported by the folks that own Snake Park. Mostly local Masai frequent the clinic, which is run by a couple of nurses who never get a day off. I missed most of the interesting cases that Sonia had seen in the morning (like extracting maggots from a child's neck. Apparently, there are these flies that lay their eggs in laundry drying on the line, then the eggs hatch and the maggots work their way into the skin of some unfortunate human. Needless to say, most everyone irons their clothes when they come off the line which fries the eggs. Unfortunately, I had given my laundry to a local Masai woman to do that very day...), though I did see a woman who had an ankle that had gone septic, and a fellow came in with a STD (I left the room for that one). STDs are rather difficult to treat in communities where multiple wives are standard because everyone has to be treated together and typically at least one of the wives is pregnant at any given time, unable to take appropriate meds. It was quite fascinating to flip through the logs and note that injuries sustained from things like snake bites were not uncommon. It was quite disconcerting, however, to be flipping through the logs and hear the decidedly out of place twang of Shania Twain singing "I Feel Like a Woman" blaring from a small stereo surrounded by waiting Masai. Regardless, it was heartening to see a successful, working example of free health care for an underserved population in operation.
