After 20 hours flight time without issues, our team arrived at Kilimanjaro International Airport. From the airport we traveled an hour by bus to the town of Arusha. Our exhaustion was fueled with adrenaline and we were all so happy to turn anticipation into reality.

If the location of Tanzania seems a little fuzzy to you, a point of reference is Jane  Goodall who made her home here studying the chimpanzees. It’s also a trivia buff’s answer to, “Where is the tallest mountain in Africa?”  You get an extra point if you can also name Mt. Kilimanjaro, which we missed seeing from our airplane because of the night time darkness. And that beautiful gem called Tanzanite, discovered near Arusha, can only be found here in Tanzania.

Tanzania lies on the equator. However, since the town of Arusha lies on the side of Mount  Meru, which towers outside our hotel window at an elevation of 4600 feet, the temperatures resemble a typical Minnesota summer day.  

They speak Swahili here, tho English is readily used.  The CSI team has Tanzanian interpreters to bridge the language gap and ensure accuracy in a field where there is no room for error.  In the meanwhile, a quick “Habari” hello made us feel kind of cool for the moment.

It’s going to be a big day today as we will meet the local medical staff, lay out our plans for the week, and screen patients to determine if they are candidates for surgery.  We can hardly contain our smiles, just like some of our new little patients will soon be able to do too.

~ Susan McMullan, CSI Medical Records