Travel Writing Blog #3 - Chapters 3 & 4

"I remember the jacaranda trees," Griffin says at the beginning of chapter three, vaguely echoing Meryl Streep's "I had a farm in Africa" opening to her Academy Award winner "Out of Africa." Griffin, however, goes on to describe a very different Nairobi from that of Baroness von Blixen/Isak Dinesen's stories.

Chapters three and four take us from Griffin's arrival at the Nairobi Club, where he ends up living during his two year stay, through his first meeting with Mike Gerber, the director of AMREF/The Flying Doctors Service, the arrival of his wife Krystyne, and a flight with an aging French member of the Service's staff, nicknamed "Mama Daktari." He also introduces the cast of characters who make up the hangar crew of The Flying Doctors Service.

During one of his first out-trips, he accompanies eighty-eight year-old Dr. Anne Spoerry, or "Mama Daktari," as she's known to her African patients, to Marsabit, a small town in the Northern region of Kenya, East of Lake Turkana. There, he is introduced to the age-old interaction between Africans and whites, and the way Africans view medical assistance. Dr. Spoerry sets up shop at the airstrip, while the villagers, walking the one mile from their homes, pour in throughout the day for attention. They treat each other with respect, and Mama Daktari does what she can for as many as she can, but at the end of the day, the line is still long, and many go without help. Still, however, as Griffin and Spoerry pack up their gear, the locals break out into song, celebrating the Daktari's visit.

Griffin starts to introduce Swahili into his writing in this chapter. "Mugumu" (fig tree), "jambo" (hello), and "asante sana" (thank you) are some of the words he takes from Swahili, the language spoken by Kenya's largest tribe, the Kikuyu. He exposes us to the linguistic diversity of Africa, giving us as complete a cultural experience as is possible.