Our journey started from snow covered Northumbria, skidding down the narrow icy lanes towards the A1 and ended 3 days later (after various forms of public transport – car, plane, taxi, dalai, coach and three wheeler cycle!) in hot and humid Dodoma which is situated in central Tanzania. [click to continue...]
February 2009
Next stop was to see the progress of the medical dispensary. The building project has brought jobs to men from Mnase and an adjacent village. At the moment the only medical help is a visiting doctor, once a month, for pregnant women and children under 5. Men, children over 5 and all other women have to walk or cycle 10km to the nearest small dispensary. Inside the new unit will be a waiting room a doctor’s room, an inoculation room and dispensary hatch, a store room and 2 small bedrooms for men and women.
Another short video about the construction work going on in the village.
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Seeing the renovated water pump working was very moving and hugely exciting. A dream in 2005 had become a reality. The village committee had decided to charge 20 TZS for a container of water (about 0.1 pence), this enables someone to be employed to look after the pump, pay for the fuel and allow people from the 4 other satellite villages to collect water.
We have put together a short video using pictures and video snap shots of the unfolding story of water coming to the village of Mnase in central Tanzania.
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Early this morning we set off to Mnase village in what can only be described as a metal moving object crammed to absolute capacity with people, chickens and general household objects. This picture gradually got worse as people finding no room through the doors started climbing in through the windows ….. and every once in a while there would be startled looks at the realisation that there were Msungu’s (white people) on the bus! [click to continue...]
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We had breakfast with the Minister of Infrastructure for Tanzania today, the Hon. Hezekiah Ndahani Chibulunje (we had met him in 2005 when the Government had sent an envoy to meet us and hear about the Sing to the Well project). 2 years ago the World Bank offered finance to help remote villages in the Dodoma region with drilling wells. [click to continue...]
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As you can imagine there was much joy when we were able to pass on a gift of a keyboard from a musician friend in the States to our friends in Dodoma, central Tanzania. The interesting story was getting it into the country ….. when we arrived a custom official tried to pocket 200,000 TSH for us to bring the keyboard into the country. When we said we did not have that money on us … he gave himself away by replying “How much can you afford?”
Sadly this was not the only story of corruption during our trip to Africa. We called his bluff, and finally after the usual waiting game … he got fed up and let us go through!
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This video made me smile ….. good job Matt!
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