If you want to meet someone whose life has been a true Odyssey, let me introduce my dad Roy David Shaffer. From the time he was a newborn in 1925 being driven home from the hospital in Ken-ya riding with his mother in the wicker basket sidecar of an ancient Harley- Davidson, to his 2021 remembrance tour, at age 96, around Kenya and Tanzania in a modern Range Rover, his life has been full of twists, turns and delights. This book gives glimpses of that final tour visiting the places he worked, and people he worked with, all perpetuating the principles he practiced. You’ll also see the high regard his colleagues still have for him and his lifelong dedication to better public health.

Roy was born of missionaries and had a missionary zeal to serve others as a teacher and a doctor. He discovered his aptitude for the medical field as a 19-year-old in the US Army, serving as a medic in the ETO (European Theater of Operations) in WWII. It wasn’t until he was married and had four kids that he went to medical school at age 30. His medical career from then on was mostly in East Africa, starting with the British colonial government, followed by AMREF (African Medical & Research Foundation), the Flying Doctors, private practice, MAP (Medical Assistance Program), and teaching at the medical schools at the University of Nairobi and the Kilimanjaro Christian Medical Center.

When asked the secret to his long-life Dad inevitably responds with “I married a saint.” That saint was the late Better Lane Shaffer, my beloved Mom.

He is also a devoted family man who cherishes time together around the dinner table and around a campfire. Even though his work meant a lot of travel, occasionally one or more of us kids were invited to tag along in the Land Rover or VW Micro Bus full of medical supplies and camping gear. He taught us to respect all people by his example. I watched how he engaged people with immediate genuine interest whether we were at an embassy function or in a mud hut.

Roy’s odyssey continues. He keeps on ticking, to borrow a phrase. No one I know, of any age, is so familiar with current affairs or reads more books or is more ready to discuss practical scientific ideas, than my dad. He lives to share his zeal with others. Now, with his move to Olasiti in Tanzania, he enters a final phase of his Odyssey that has taken him around the world many times, literally, but will end in Africa, where his heart is.

Dan Shaffer

Albuquerque

May 2022