I was lured out of a blissful slumber at 1:00 this morning by the ever growing awareness that my body weigh was not perfectly centered. The ground had sunk slightly in one corner at the head of my bed. It’s amazing how our bodies can pick up the slightest discomfort in a state of unconsciousness. when the attempt to ignore it only resulted in more tossing and turning then I was willing to endure, I grudgingly got out of bed and tried to fix the problem with a chunk of scrap wood. Satisfied with my efforts I slid back into bed and dozed off. It didn't take long for my body to notify me that my ability to level my bed with a sleepy eye was severely lacking. I spent the rest of the morning readjusting these wood ends a number of times. After one of the small wood chunks slid from it’s position, sending my bed to the ground with a loud thump, I gave up and got up to start my day. Besides, it was already 5:00 and there wasn't much hope of making up for the sleep that was lost. This is just one of those things that you learn to deal with when you live in a tent.
while others where trying to prevent catastrophes from fire, i was creating my own with a element called water. we have what is called a twin tub for washing our clothes. this handy little machine is the luxurious way have hand washing! all you have to do is fill the tub from the hose, let the machine do the spinning. when everything is clean you wring out the clothes and hang them to dry. on this particular day....my first time using this machine i might add.... the water pressure was extremely low because of complications with the water pump on the farm. i secured the hose in the tub and felt that i had more than enough time to wring out the first load and hang it out to dry. i did, however, check on it a few times...just in case. apparently i wasn't cautious enough. the hose fell out and, oh, look at that! the water pressure is back! this is out side the kitchen. the inside of the kitchen looked more like a wading pool. i had to push the water out with this large squidgy which was this was a bit of a challenge since the floor is not completely level (sounding familiar?) and it slanted down away from the door. Here is another fun moment. 25 Mozambique pastors traveled from afar to attend this years pastor training conference. I didn't have much of a hand in this even other than stamping together these booklets. Sounds like a easy enough but many seemingly simple tasks can be a challenge when liveing in the bush of Africa. The dilemma was that I didn’t have a stapler long enough to staple the middle of the page, or rather, the cress of the booklet. (very high quality pamphlets we make in Mozambique!) and with the lack of a office supply store down the road I was left to improvise using the staple side of one stapler, borrowed from Alta, against the metal guide of the other another stapler, borrowed from Lynn. It had to be done just right to prevent the hole contraption from slipping out from under my hands sending papers and staples flying.
Just a few weeks ago I purchased a top of the line bicycle from Chimoio. With three trips into town serching high and low, negotiating prices, and excepting broken promises to have the bike ready “tomorrow” we finally narrowed it down to what we felt was a quality bicycle that maybe needed only a few adjustments. Those few adjustments turned into the breaks being tweaked, the seat raised, the chain replaced and then later shortened, the gears tightened, several spokes removed to straighten the back wheel, ugly mud guards removed, the front wheel aligned with the handle bar and pretty much every screw on the bike tightened. After all that, the bike still served me well on our 72 km ride to Vanduzie! And the chain only fell off twice. Not bad! This warning on the front of my high quality bike should have been my first clue to what I was getting myself into.
Monday, September 17, 2007
Saturday, September 8, 2007
rebuilding
Lynn and I have been taking frequent visits to Salete’s to see her progress in recovering from the fires that burnt down her home. This is Salete’s temporary abode while she works on building a more sturdy, fire resistant home. Fire resistant, as fire resistant as you can get with the materials available to a typically Mozambican living in the bush.…dirt and water.
Yep! Noth’n but the right amount of dirt and water mixed together, poured into this mold and dried for three days and you got yourself one sturdyish brick for a new house. But if you can bake the bricks, well, then your laughing.
This bucket holds enough water to make ten bricks. Salete has 600 bricks made and she will need another 400. You might think she is well on her way but one thing to keep in mind is that Salete has to walk with this bucket to get her water. Lynn was told that the water pump was far away. Lynn explained to me that when a local tells you that something is close you can expect to walk up to a hour so, if they say it’s far, then it’s far! It is likely that Salete only makes at the most two trips in one day.
All that work and she still finds time to enjoy the day with her grandson who seems to be getting cuter each time I see him. I think I have enough pictures of him to tack one on each of the bricks of their soon to be new home. Since Salete’s son found himself a job and is no longer free to help his mother build ASAM has contracted a young man to haul water and help with the building.
Yep! Noth’n but the right amount of dirt and water mixed together, poured into this mold and dried for three days and you got yourself one sturdyish brick for a new house. But if you can bake the bricks, well, then your laughing.
This bucket holds enough water to make ten bricks. Salete has 600 bricks made and she will need another 400. You might think she is well on her way but one thing to keep in mind is that Salete has to walk with this bucket to get her water. Lynn was told that the water pump was far away. Lynn explained to me that when a local tells you that something is close you can expect to walk up to a hour so, if they say it’s far, then it’s far! It is likely that Salete only makes at the most two trips in one day.
All that work and she still finds time to enjoy the day with her grandson who seems to be getting cuter each time I see him. I think I have enough pictures of him to tack one on each of the bricks of their soon to be new home. Since Salete’s son found himself a job and is no longer free to help his mother build ASAM has contracted a young man to haul water and help with the building.
This area may look familiar to some of you. This would be the ASAM farm after encountering a bush fire of our own... and in the back is the wooden hut. (just a little too close for comfort!) With Lynn and Dwight in Chimoio and Francois and Alta in South Africa, Nat and I, along with all the workers, fought a blazing fire for four and a half hours. It started by Francois and Alta’s house and was gaining momentum in the wrong direction. We frantically tried to organize a constant flow of water buckets from two different water taps along with the one garden hose in the front yard. Just as the fire seemed to be subsiding around the house it moved with ferocity towards the wooden hut. I don’t think I have uttered so many prayers as I did in those long, intensity charged fire fighting hours. I couldn't help but think of the big red fire trucks that I have seen in the western world more times than I can count and how handy one of those beautiful trucks would come in very handy at this very moment. Still I believe those brave firefighters would be amazed how twenty men (and one woman J ) with water and tree branches can prevent the entire farm from becoming ashes. Though I don’t think they would have approved of my fire fighting attire…a wrap-around-skirt and flip- flops. Don’t worry, I have already been scolded for that one.
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