Lambaréné, Gabon

2019-09-25: Lambaréné. Visit to a Nobel Peace Prize : the Albert Schweitzer Hospital.

After leaving Libreville a little after noon yesterday we arrive today around 11:40 am on Lambaréné. We are of course entitled to a checkpoint where the policeman begins by asking us "permission to travel in Gabon". This is actually called a laissez-passer or carnet de passages. We handed him ours, opened on the “Gabon” page with the customs stamp. The way he looks at it, inspects it and turns it around makes it feel like it's the first time he's held one in his hands. He will even start flipping through the 25 unused and all identical pages. He falls back on the driver's license, but again he seems to be holding a European license for the first time in his fingers. What could he have verified in the end? All that remains is to take a look around the cabin. He asks us politely because obviously he knows he is not allowed to, only out of curiosity, he tells us, because he has never seen a motorhome for real, "only in the movies! ". 

Arrival in Lambaréné by the bridge over the Ogooué.

We can finally enter Lambaréné. After doing some shopping in the city center Christine suggests going straight to Dr. Schweitzer's hospital and eating there in the parking lot before visiting. Rather, I had considered settling quietly at Carpe Diem and crossing by canoe to the hospital, which is on the opposite bank of the Ogooué. But why not ?
We therefore retrace our steps and leave the peninsula via the large bridge by which we arrived. 

 

Unfortunately, we will not be able to reach the museum parking lot because, once again, of an electric cable which hangs too low above the access road. We’ll turn around the aisles of the hospital a bit before we find something to park pretty well for our lunch at the dental clinic.

Our parking space at the hospital.

We reach the museum on foot after the snack. The tour is guided and costs 5,000 CFA (€ 7.85) per person.
The Albert-Schweitzer Hospital was founded in 1913 by Albert Schweitzer and his wife Hélène Bresslau.

 
The first hospital was almost completely destroyed during the First World War, after the forced absence of its founders - as German citizens, they were expelled from French Equatorial Africa and interned in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence.
When he returned to Lambaréné in 1924, Albert Schweitzer then built the second hospital, which would be completed in September 1925, with a capacity of 150 patients.

Following a famine and an epidemic of dysentery which raged at the beginning of 1926, Albert Schweitzer realized that his hospital was too small for the needs and that he could not extend it on the ground that he owns ; he therefore decides to build a third hospital, a few kilometers further on, on a larger site. This is where we are today. The old hospital moved to the new buildings on January 21, 1927.
We start the visit with the old doctor's house. After the large room where period photos are displayed, various letters from personalities who supported the project, the biography of Albert Schweitzer and the history of the hospital, we move on to the living rooms. The old buildings are made of wood. The scenery hasn't changed much.

Albert Schweitzer was born in Kaysersberg in Alsace, then German, on January 13, 1875. His medical vocation was late, at the age of 30. He had initially turned to religious life. Doctor of philosophy and theology, he wanted to become a missionary within the framework of the Protestant missions.
After reading the article by a missionary stationed in Gabon, in which the latter spoke of the shortage of doctors, he resigned in 1905 from his post as professor at the theological universityof Strasbourg and began his medical studies. In 1912, he prepared his thesis and got married, before preparing to leave for Africa a few months later.
In 1952, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, the money he received was used to build a district dedicated to the lepers he treated. 

No ! It’s not Parsifal, the doctor’s pelican, but maybe one of his descendants.

 

Built on the right bank of the Ogooué river, this wooden hospital is made up of blocks of several buildings painted white and covered with red painted metal sheets. The first block is that of the refectory. The second block is the museum, the house in which Albert Schweitzer himself resided. The most compact unit is the one linked to its functions (box for operated patients, consultation room, pharmacy, former cabin for European staff). The vegetable garden, the cemetery and the landing stage (at the time you came to the hospital by canoe, the road did not exist) constitute the last block, the grave of Dr Schweitzer is clearly visible there.
The staff came from various nationalities, funding came from several international donors, care was free.

The hospital buildings.

The consultation room.

 

The visit is very interesting and brings us to the fore a great human project that everyone knows by name but that few have had the opportunity to approach so closely. Too bad our guide is so lacking in enthusiasm, she just bravely recites her lesson! 

The operating room donated by Prince Rainier of Monaco in 1960.

The pharmacy.

 

Thierry at the dentist.

Christine in front of the doctor's grave.

Christine in front of the museum.

 Besides all the praise with which the "good doctor" was able to be covered, there are also many much less flattering testimonies which it is not superfluous to read (see Wikipedia: https://fr.wikipedia.org/ wiki / Albert_Schweitzer # Reviews)

We are hosted at Carpe Diem in Said.

Said from Carpe Diem and Christine