Tancan 2013 Medical Mission

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Saturday, August 10^th - Sunday August 11^th, 2013



Its Flying Time!!





We woke up early the next morning, had our continental breakfast of Belgium waffles (yum!), yogourt, oatmeal, coffee and tea and our first malaria pill. Then it was off to the Buffalo airport, where we checked in our luggage and went through security. Renata, got stopped because she had too many liquids in her suitcase (Pepto Bismol, Acne Medication, etc.) I guess she did not get the no liquids or gels memo. Luckily, nothing was confiscated.





Our flight out of Buffalo was delayed by 45 minutes. We were worried because we could miss our connecting flight from Washington to Zurich. However, the airline attendant ensured that we should have enough time to make our connection. When we reached the Washington Airport we took escalator after escalator and finally a train to finally reach our departure gate. As you can tell from my explanation, the Washington D.C Dulles Airport was huge. We arrived at the boarding gate just as the plane was starting to board passengers.





In Zurich, we met up with the rest of the Tancan 2013 team from Canada minus 2 people who missed their flight out of Ottawa. Joanne, the mission trip coordinator, worked with the airlines to rebook their tickets for the next day and ensure that they had transportation to the clinic; a lot of work and I commend her for it.





At the Zurich airport we discovered that our flight was going to be delayed 3 hours. A week before a fire damaged the international terminal of the Nairobi airport. The flight from Zurich was going to do a pit stop in Nairobi to pick up some passengers and refuel before reaching Dar Saleem. Consequently, Swiss Air, the airline we were taking from Zurich to Dar Saleem, most likely had problems finding an arrival gate for our flight at the Nairobi airport. They treated the passagers to a complimentary 20 Franc gift voucher for food for the inconvenience. The variety of restaurants at the Zurich international terminal was limited. Renata and I ordered some subs and coffee from one of select restaurants and then spent the remaining amount of time exploring the shops and getting to know our Canadian Tancan 2013 team.





When we finally arrived in Dar Saleem, it was around 12:30 in the evening. We each had to get our $50 USD visa. This took approximately one hour. It was a long process waiting in line. It felt like we were in a lineup at a police station. The procedure included finger prints of both hands and a picture. When the group received their visas, we headed off to the seminary in Dar Saleem for a 3 hour rest break before we had to leave for Songea. I took a short nap, a refreshing shower and then got ready for the next day.

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