I've Got 97 Problems...

The volunteer bungalow at dawn:

Fortunately I do not have the problem of getting shot between the eyes with a poison arrow. The same cannot be said for the patient who was helicoptered in recently.

After the initial shock of seeing a helicopter-- the first to ever come here-- details began to trickle out of the Emergency Room. The injured men (the other had his leg broken with a club) said they had been policing a game reserve and had gotten into a skirmish with a group of poachers. At first I thought they were government game wardens, but then it came out that they were privately employed and guarding a private reserve. They arrived in a helicopter after all, and they were accompanied by a white man who wore shorts so short he must have been a white African. Both these details suggest the invalids were not associated with the government.

Their story about poachers seemed flimsy. If they had actually been interdicting poachers, they probably would have been shot with a firearm rather than a bow and arrow. A more likely explanation is that they had tussled with some of the semi-nomadic Datoga cattle herders. I'm told that several wealthy foreigners have bought up large swathes of land for private hunting reserves, and often the Masai and Datoga don't even know that the land they are herding on is no longer public. I imagine the Datoga wouldn't take too kindly to being ordered to leave, especially if they were buzzed with a helicopter first.

Sorry for not taking many pictures. Here's another sunset:

Problem #3 is trying to find/or make a gym setup here. My shoulder is finally healed up, and I'm looking to start lifting again, but apparently weights can be hard to come by. I've been running most mornings with Dr. Gabrielle-- also an opportunity to practice my Kiswahili with him-- and I've found a conveniently sized tree branch for pull-ups, but aside from that I haven't been very active.

My current plan is to buy a steel bar and then make weights out of concrete that can fit on either end. There are several issues that need to be solved for this method though:
1. How can I mold the concrete so that each weight in a pair is the same size and weight?
2. How can I control how much each one will weigh?
3. How can I reinforce the concrete so that the weights do not crumble, crack or come apart?
4. What shape should I make the weights?
5. How can I make a stand that I can trust not to fail and drop the bar on me after benching?
6. How will the weights be attached to the bar?

In other news, I got to sit in on a class Dr. Duane gave on skin grafts. Dr. Duane is an 80 year old surgeon from Nebraska who is visiting for three months to set up our new operating room. He's quite a character, a down-to-earth, very hard-working former farmer. He just brought a new Dermatone machine for harvesting grafts and taught all of our doctors how to use it. It's basically a giant electric shaver that takes off the entire layer of skin rather than just hair. Very interesting stuff.

Dr. Duane (right) explaining the Dermatone to Dr. Mmile (left) and Dr. Gabrielle (center)