Controlling the water station in Thugunui

rs. This morning I brought the fuel for the machines of the water station up in the mountain in Thugunui. Our Askari Egidion controlled the water meters and found a small lack that we have to fix next week. In the afternoon I will drive to Nairobi to meet Alex Keller from Canada. He will assist us here at the Rhein-Valley Hospital for three months. He alreday ran the Quebec City Marathon and made some fundraising for us.

A birth the Kenyan way

rs. A birth - the Kenyan way. You arrive at the hospital a little before midnight and wait for the baby to be born, at 5:45 h in the morning the baby appears and in the afternoon you go home. The family members then came and greeted the couple.

6-hour walk with patient

rs. A group of seven people arrived at the hospital at lunch time. They brought an ill patient with a self-made stretcher and descended the mountain for six hours! Our doctor Wanjara immediately gave him an infusion. The man was dried out. He then got some antibiotics. After 4 hours he was considerably better. His brother, who was among the group anxiously asked if they have to pay something for the treatment. I told him that we first do the necessary and then we can speak about possible payment if at all. Asked why they waited so long to bring him, they said that they first tried to cure him with herbs but without success. They also feared high hospital costs. Until some neighbor told them to go to the Rhein-Valley Hospital...

Swiss friends visit the Hospital

rs. This morning I got an SMS announcing some Swiss friends to arrive at the Rhein-Valley Hospital in 20 Minutes. So we got ready to greet them and our doctor Wanjara proudlly showed them our premises. Dani, Bruno, Priska and Sibylle are currently working for the Swiss Arlines in Nairobi. Dani said hat he is very impressed about our work. He checked our blog several times in the past and was happy to see everything 1:1.

Vaccination and check-up for the babies

rs. Today we had our children's day. Luckily the rain stopped so that the mothers could descend from the mountain without problems. The waiting room was full. Many came for vaccinations. We can use one bottle of vaccination medicine for five babies, but we cannot keep the medicine a long time outside the cooler. That's why we invite them all at the same time. We also medically checked the small ones. Our laboratory assistant Caroline helped fill the registration cards, because we have to report to the MOH (Ministry of Health) monthly. There is also a statistic about the current diseases in Kenya.

Hail and rain in the Rift Valley Province

rs. This girl in our waiting room can also not understand how our weather plays crazy today: hail and rain the whole day. And a temperature of 16 °C which is very low for Kenya. What is worst that our refugees have not enough warm clothes and already many people came with colds.

Bugwua's family

rs. Bugwua, one of our refugees is proud to present himself with his family for a picture. They all seem to be happy to be here, although they lost all their belongings. The main thing for them is to be alive and getting some care and shelter. Bugwua earns some pocket money by repairing shoes and giving extra lessons for the school people in the evening.

Sunday games in the shadow

Finally unloading the kidstokids Container

rs. Yesterday was the moment to unload the many school supplies that were sent to us through the kidstokids organization in Switzerland. Our crew was amazed to see them. They have never seens such quality school chairs. First they thought they were all for our office. Then I explained them that they will be given to our Kenyan schools in the region. They checked out the chairs themselves and couldn't believe that the height could be manually changed. Tegla Loroupe who will get part of the equipment for her new Peace School in Kapenguria can only organize the transport to her place in 2 weeks, so we brought them to a tent to store them in the meantime. The rest stays in the container for he moment until we have made the plan how to distribute them to our schools in Thugunui.

Church wants to dispute our property!

rs. It's unbelievable how the church authorities react towards our property. Today 8 of them came to investigate and to put border marks on our ground. We could only laugh about their strange and impertinent conduct. We do not have to worry. Next week the officials of the Government will come to finalize our border lines according to the plan we established when we got the property several years ago. But what is frightening, that the people from the church seem to have a heart of stone...

kidstokids Container opened

rs. Today we opened the container that we recently got thanks to the help of the Swiss kidstokids organization, a department of the International humanitarian organization "The Oneness-Heart Tears and Smiles". The container is full of school supplies and packages that were collected by children from Switzerland, Austria, the Czech Republic and Finland, for their little Kenyan brothers and sisters. Tomorrow we will start unloading the school banks and chairs that will be given to Tegla Loroupe for her Peace School in Kapenguria. All my crew is eager to help tomorrow because it is a special day for them to help unload the container and discover all the things she normally only dream of.


Mama Matata (Ruth Schäfer), director of the Rhein-Valley Hospital climbs as the first onto the gymnasium mattress in the container.

Wrong accusations from the church

rs. Today I went early to the hospital. I heard that Mr. Bernhard from the church council wanted to check the measurements of our property. They still believe we are working on foreign ground. Fortunately we have our official plans since 2005. But still they want to threaten us. After some loud discussions, they realized that they are wrong. But we do not want to wait until further discussions arise, we try to go to the Governmental offices in Nakuru town on Thursday to get an official certification of our ground plans, so that there will not be any needs for further recriminations.

Cleaning day

rs. Today we had a cleaning day - outwardly at the facade a in the house washing the curtains. Also in the camp everything seems to be fine and clean. If you instruct the people correctly and have some patients you can achieve quite a lot, even in the rural area of Kasambara...

Sunday in the Nakuru National Park

After all I have to take the chances to visit our Nakuru National Park when I live so nearby! It's always nice to be here to watch all the wild animals in their natural habitat.
-Mama Matata

Blog translations now available

We included a new feature that you can find on the top right side of the blog. It is a Google gadget, that allows you to have the blog texts translated in many languages. Although the translations are computer generated certainly not perfect at all, they still give you the chance to read our blog texts in your language. Check it out!

School ist starting next week

rs. Peter and his sister are waiting until Mama has finished her laundry. Summer vacation is over and next week school starts again and for many children this means entering a higher class. Some even have to go to Thugunui up the mountain about one hour walking. Here the schools are quite full. The children who have a long way to school asked if they can get a lunchbag so that they can stay there the whole day. If the teachers agree, it's certainly possible.

Meeting people on the way to Thugunui

rs. Today I wanted to go to Thugunui where we have our mountain water station. But on the way I met so many people who wanted to speak with me, that I didn't reach my destination. But anyway it was good to have the possibility to contact the inhabitants. Some of them already started to build a new home here. I could manage to come back before it started to rain.

Active day with Malaria and Diabetes

rs. Many things to do today. Some patients came for a control and one girl was tested which Maleria medication is the correct one. There are various types of Malaria, so we usually make a test first. If you give a wrong medication, it might not help but can endanger the life of the person. Other patients came with Diabetes, still very frequently found here in Kenya. Our doctor Wanjara tries to inform the people in detail about the correct food plans. Some who do not listen come back to us as emergency cases.

A movie for our refugees

rs. Today we had a surprise for our refugees. We installed a screen and a projector and showed them an animated film of 1 1/2 h. Many saw these video machines for the first time in their life.

Fence reparations

Reparations of our fence so that the animals cannot enter our property. Otherways we have the neighbor's chicken in our kitchen!

Catholic church hinders our activities

rs. Our refugee women were in the garden since the morning. They have a lot of joy to cultivate it and to see how their vegetables are growing that they can use in the kitchen. Unfortunately the catholic church, which is our neighbor, only thinks how they can hinder our activities. They went to the Governmental Offices in town to declare that our women ruin their property! By the way we are working on our property which is obvious according to the border lines on the map. So I will have to discuss the matter with the authorities as well as the church people. I always thought that the bible says, "love your next as yourself". But nothing is to feel from this love...