It was a standard beginning to Sheona-style traveling. I book a flight post-call…why not, it’s a wasted day anyway, right? Packing in a mad rush, semi-comatose through security and then exhausted I finally slide into my seat on the plane. Complete relief envelops me and I promptly pass out. I awake foggy brained, dry mouthed and with drool caked down the side of my cheek as we begin descent into Toronto. The perfect opportunity for the lovely Nigerian couple (of ‘traditional African build’ as Mma Ramostwe would say) beside me to engage in conversation. They are profs in Washington DC and think Hopkins isn’t such a bad school for me to go to.
After a short flight on a plane smaller than the ones they use to fly to Yellowknife I find myself in a taxi in Baltimore. Ayaad, the driver, is originally from Eritrea.
You know where that is? He turns with a wide smile of surprise on his face.
Ayaad is driving taxi part-time while finishing his engineering degree. We discuss East African politics, Somali-Ethiopian relations and after discovering my profession he tells me the story of how his mother died while birthing his younger sister.
You see, they just don’t have the technology… so women die during childbirth. He explains.
I suggested it is perhaps not the technology at issue but access to it.
We reach the hotel and I hand him my credit card. He pulls out his iPhone, plugs in a little white box to the top and swipes my credit card. I sign the screen with my finger and he emails me the receipt. He notices that I’m quite impressed by the transaction.
You haven’t seen this before? Oh, you much not travel much!
Oh Ayaad, if you only knew.
I need to download the Preventing Maternal Death App.
