time keeps a moving

Time keeps a moving, I cannot believe that in one month it will be Christmas 2013 already! The fact that time is moving along at quite a pace at least means the our first 3 months apart has gone by quite quickly. It has not been easy, but thanks to technology we have mostly been able to keep in good contact. In less than 3 weeks Amelia will visit Arusha on a one month break. We have been counting down the months, weeks and days towards this first milestone. One of the good things is that Amelia is really enjoying the course and the experience she is gaining from it. At the moment they are traveling in Venezuela which is the birthplace of El Sistema. Visiting some of the many El Sistema inspired music centers they are learning from the experience of others. Read more about her time and experience on her blog.

In the meantime busy times were also the easier times for me. With our Dodoma pilot moving on the the larger Caravan aircraft and eventually relocating to South Sudan, I have been covering the clinics from Dodoma as well. This meant 5-6 days of flying out of Dodoma the first week of each month. The second week I'd be home in Arusha with 2-3 flying days, 3rd week in South Maasai for 2 days and the last week of each month for 3 days in North Maasai.


At the mobile clinics I have slowly moved up from only helping with the weighing of babies, to opening syringes and giving oral vaccines, to loading syringes and even recently I gave some tetanus shots to adults. I can now identify all the vaccines, interpret the clinic cards and I know who gets what and where to give the injections. But I'm not quite ready to make the babies cry...




Recently I did some test landings at 2 new airstrips in the South Maasai area, it was great to be the first person to land a plane at these villages. I was greeted with cheers, tears, songs and prayers. We pray that we will be in a position to reach these communities with regular flights.

There are some more photos of this joyful day on the Wings4Christ Facebook group. I also sent out a W4C October 2013 newsletter, get it here if you missed it (quality is better if you download it).

Thank you for the support and prayers, pray especially for us as we face many challenges and changes in order to operate cost effectively in Tanzania while continuing to serve those in need.

It has been way too long!

It has been way too long! So, instead of trying to explain what I have been up to I will just come out with my main excuse: I GOT ENGAGED!

Although that should cover it, I feel that I do need to explain myself in a little more detail, because it is not all that happened since my last post in June. First of all, shortly after that post about Babu Pauli who received the surgery he needed after the medevac, I received news that he made it back to his home village and was recovering well.

I spent June and July on my first home assignment in South Africa. It was a great time of catching up with family and friends. I also had some opportunities at churches and groups to share in person what I have been up to. My 15 month old nephew was an absolute treat and has grown quite a bit since I last saw him at 7 days old! Technology these days make it possible to stay in touch with loved ones, but it pales in comparison to spending time with them. I had a wonderful time relaxing and reconnecting with the people I miss when I am away.

A bonus during my trip was the fact that I was able to join the 9th annual youth outreach with my home church to the Karoo town of Merweville. Nine years down the line and I can see how God has worked in many lives, including my own as the experience played a big part in my calling as a full time missionary.

Yes! I am engaged, some of it happened quite quickly but most of it has been developing over some time. Amelia has been living and working as a teacher in Arusha for the past 4 years. We first met through a colleague and mutual friend. We both attend Arusha Community Church, where Amelia has also been involved with the music ministry. When I started spending more time in Arusha during the second half of last year we became friends as part of a group of younger adults.

God's timing worked out perfectly as our friendship turned into a relationship earlier this year. Only after she was accepted as a 2014 El Sistema Fellow at the New England Conservatory in Boston, USA. Unfortunately this means that she will be spending most of the next 9 months away. However, it as an amazing opportunity to learn from the music programme that has impacted thousands of youth in Venezuela and around the world.

Things worked out well that she was able to join me for just over 2 weeks during my home assignment in Cape Town. I saw this as a great opportunity to show of my beautiful home town, ask the BIG question and then show off my beautiful fiancee to family and friends!

Now we are at the start of the first four months apart until Amelia has a month break in December when she will be able to visit Arusha. Thankfully we will both be quite busy, which always help time to go by faster, or at least seem to...

First South Maasai Flights

Malambo Checkout

Medevac Update

I recently managed to see the old man who had the head injury whom I flew from his village to a nearby hospital. The hospital I took him to, Haydom Lutheran Hospital, is still pretty remote and a good eight hour drive from Arusha. It is pretty well equipped for a remote hospital due to many years of input from the Norwegian Lutheran Mission, for that reason the missionary doctor from the mission hospital near Pauli's village suggested that I take him to Haydom. He was able to get a CT scan and was stabilized but in the end surgery was still required to remove the pressure from his head.

MAF serves Haydom on a regular basis and we also fly monthly mobile clinics for them. However, I do not always get to spend much time there. A couple of weeks ago I flew a group of biological researchers in and waited to fly them out later that day. So, I asked around and manged to find Pauli in the surgery recovery ward. I could not communicate with him, but the doctors say that he is making a good recovery.

Please continue to pray for him and also his family member who has to take care of him while they are far away from their home village

how quickly a day can change

Although last Wednesday (1 May) was a public holiday, I had some work duties and a meeting so I thought I'd take Thursday off instead.

However, a call from our Operations Manager changed my plans with a wake up call containing two relevant words: "Medevac standby"

While on standby you prepared as much as you can to be ready as soon as to "Go call" comes. It's a strange 'place' to be; you don't have all the details, so you don't know exactly what to plan for; how many people will you need to carry? Do you remove seats for a stretcher? Where exactly will the pick up take place? Is the patient stable, mobile, conscious etc? This is added to the regular questions of weather, timing and fuel. You do this all with some sense of urgency, at least until you have more information and in the end it can all be called off...

I did not get called off and it ended up being a pretty straight forward medi-transfer flight between relatively large airports, with medical teams on both ends.

First Medi-transfer

The next morning I received an early call form the office again, but this time only from the finance department asking that I do my monthly cash count. I joked that it at least does not change my day as much as a call from the Ops department can.

Only to read my mails two hours later and pick up correspondence between Operations and the doctor from remote mission hospital about a medical patient to join the return flight from the hospital after the scheduled monthly flights the following week. However, the patient's condition deteriorated as the mails came through and I was put on active standby for the second day in a row. I prepared and headed straight for the airport to prepare, reconverting my small people carrier into an ambulance once again. As I finished I received the call that the patient became completely unresponsive, he would not make it through the weekend until the scheduled clinic flight.  So, off I went to collect him and take him to a hospital where he would be able to get a CT scan and possibly the head surgery he would require. The old man was in pretty bad shape as I handed him over to the hospital staff.

Pauli Peter Medevac

The next morning I hear that sad news that he passed away and the family is requesting that I return the body to their village when I go there for the clinics. I go through the following few hours sad and quite upset, especially with the previous hospital which sent him home with some aspirins for his headaches. However, as it sometimes is with bush telegraphs, news gets distorted and I receive the great news that he is still alive!

The latest news was that he was stabilized and moved to the larger Kilimanjaro Christian Medical Center in Moshi. It has certainly been an amazing privilege to be in a position to help this old man, please pray that he will make a full recovery...

Catching up

One problem about getting behind on blogging is that I end up staring at this screen for hours trying to think back what happened and where to start telling you about it...

So, it was Christmas, New Years, my birthday, my mother's birthday, some friends' birthdays, mother's day, Passion Friday, Resurrection Sunday, April Fool's day and some more birthdays.

During this time I flew people around, on days with challenging weather and on very nice days, I've been happy, sad, friendly, angry, excited, frustrated, disappointed, encouraged, shocked, stressed, relieved, relaxed, tired, energized, clean, dirty, wet, dry, bored, busy and I'm sure a few more. I think I will break them down into a couple of stories of the coming weeks...

The weather makes the flying 'interesting' to say the least, now we are in the rainy season which mostly comes in the form of thunderstorms that build up towards the afternoons. The bases are generally not that low which makes flying underneath a better option than trying to out climb it in a little Cessna. Especially when you hear the big jets at 36000+ feet ask to go off track due weather. You usually have to dodge a few rainstorms along the way and hope your destination is not covered when you arrive.

Once you have arrived safely, a new challenge starts: You have to keep an eye on the weather, a storm early in the day should not be a problem because the strip should have enough time to dry before you want to leave. But what if it's really heavy and soaks everything or if it sneaks op on in later in the day, it can become quite a challenge to get everybody out of a slippery situation. Another challenge is the maintenance of the airstrips, due to the rain it quickly becomes over grown and getting people to clear it before we arrive is not always easy. So, sometimes we have get everybody together to cut some grass before we can start with the day's clinic work. Although we sometimes have to delay, divert or cancel flights and clinics, we still manage to make it to places that are now even more isolated due to the weather.

On Friday morning I heard that a bridge between Arusha and Orkesumet (main town in South Maasai) has been washed away. Later in the day we received permission to use the Orkesument airstrip which we have been struggling to renew for 8 months! Next week we will finally start with the South Maasai Safari (more details about this in another post) and I have already received calls to transport medical supplies and 2 doctors because the town is still difficult to reach.

Please pray for the challenges brought on by the extreme rains, not only for the flying but also for the roads, villages and crops that have been flooded. Pray for enough breaks in the weather that we can reach our destinations and provide services to isolated communities.