bridges newsletter 2008
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A
Br idgesAfrican
Update
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2 | Bridges Newsletter Feb 2009
ell friends, it's that time of year
again. That time when, long after
the Christmas tree has come
down and the brussel sprouts been consumed,
Kate and Dan realise that their grand idea to
make the 'Spridge's Christmas newsletter' a
regular occurrence has quite definitely failed.
Apologies for the neglect. Still, moving on from
our failure to give you a yuletide update, we now
bring you the wonder that is the 'Spridge's
sometime-between-New Years-and-Easter
newsletter'. Chances are you won't feel that
you've missed out.
So 20 0 8 eh? What a year .The new year began in
Liverpool with Dan
immersed in his
postdoctorate at
Liverpool School of
Tropical Medicine and
Kate doing a masters in
Humanitarian Studies at
the same place (we just
can't get enough of each
other). In Liverpool
(referred to by some asthe Glasgow of the
South - both boast
extremely friendly and completely
indecipherable locals), we were blessed to make
some great friendships through studies, work
and church. Since it was only the first of the 4
countries that we are scheduled to be living in
during Dan's three year postdoc, and seeing as
we only had 9 months there we decided to get
actively involved with people from the outset.
We don't regret the proactiveness one bit, but
when it reached April and time to say goodbyes,
we realised that doing this four times is going to
be a tad harder than we initially thought!
Travelling is fantastic, but making friendships
and leaving them behind just a few months later
does bring a tear. Thank goodness for the joys of
online social networking eh? Despite the fact
that internet in Malawi is something of an
epileptic sloth, our virtual relationships live on
Liverpudlians...
Wor kingwit h t heUN......Kate spent the first 2
months in Malawi
writing up her master's
dissertation and has
since been working
with the UN World
Food Programme as a
programme assistant.
Some days she's visiting
the field to ascertain
why cereals have not
arrived or maize has been stolen, other days
she's heading up distribution plans for the
delivery of food to over a million vulnerable
groups and at others she's meeting
governmental officials and NGO partners. At
one point she took over the head of programmes
job and just recently she has been running the
suboffice nutrition programme (Bear in mind
that this is the same person who believes that if
you eat a chocolate covered banana then the
good of the fruit counteracts the bad of the
chocolate to make the meal calorie neutral. Not
really nutritionally au fait let's say). Theexperience has been a worthwhile one, and of
course, not too shabby for the ol' CV. Like all
humanitarian organisations, WFP has its
darksides. Too much action and too little
reflection for the most part. And can we blame
it? Though we all know unthinking aid can
cause more harm than good, few donors pay
their NGOs to 'reflect'. Still... this is an update,
not a dissertation ;)
Par asitesandper plexity......There are lots of
different aspects
to Dan's work,
from sample
collection, cell
culture and of
course peering down microscopes to view
malaria at work. The labs are right next door to
W
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3 | Bridges Newsletter Feb 2009
the paediatric department and
our own research ward, where
children suffering from
cerebral malaria are treated.
On a busy weekend there may
be 300 patients admitted in
the main ward its 2 to a bed
and the rest on the floor. More
chilling is the number of under-
5's who die more die in a
week than in the whole of
Merseyside in a year. Not being a medic often
conjures up feelings of guilt for Dan of not
addressing the most obvious needs. And yet,
without advances in understanding the disease
the dream of a world free from malaria is
unlikely to ever come to pass. Unfortunately the
experimental work hasn't progressed quite as
Dan would have liked and at times it has been
very challenging to keep going. Fortunately he
has always had an encouraging wife who helps
him start again! There is real promise in the
work, but Dan has recently felt thwarted at
every turn. We are praying that the last month
in Malawi yields the results we're so desperate
to get.
Fr iendsandfamily.....Both our parents
and Kate's sister
(Jen) have visited
us whilst we've
been out here.
Being so far from family has not been easy so
this was a real blessing. We've managed to
squeeze in trips to Zambia (where we watched a
leopard make a
kill 20metres
from our vehicle)
and Mozambique,
both of which
have been
awesome. We've
made some
fantastic
friendships in
Malawi, and when we fly off to NZ (to visit Dan's
bro and sister) and then Sydney on April 4th
(with a 5 day stop in Capetown on the way life
is hard) it will be with a lot of sadness at the
relationships we leave behind. Sad to leave but
thankful for the time we had. And of course, just
a leetle bit excited about the surfing to come :)
Time flies and it's already almost 3yrs that we've
been married. Kate celebrated her 25th birthday
in January and Dan his 30th in February.
Marriage continues to be an incredible gift for
us both and being able to travel, make new
friends, visit new places and eat strange foods
together makes life feel like a fantastic
adventure. We thank God for it!
To Oz.....In Sydney Dan will carry on with his postdoc,while Kate as a lady of leisure and kept woman,
will spend her days contemplating life's
complexities. Ha! In the real world, Kate will
hopefully find work in something of the political
analysis/ advocacy/ policy variety. If that fails,
she'll write a best-seller ;)
We'll be in Sydney until December 2009 and
then it's onto Dublin for the last 9 months of
Dan's postdoc. After that,... who knows.Zimbabwe has a particular pull on Kate, and
Dan's not opposed to revisiting Papua New
Guinea. Hopefully by August 2010 we'll have an
idea of where God wants us. In the meantime,
come visit. We'll always find space and would
really reeeeally love to see you. Kate's cooking
has improved remarkably with marriage if that
helps.
Much love,
Dan and Kate
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