Three Birthdays and a Funeral

Hitesh – The focus of the construction has now moved to the building of the first staff house, which will be the Helsby’s house. They’re currently living in the volunteer house. When they have short-termers like us coming over for a few months, we would stay in the volunteer house.

Just a bit background to the staff house – it was originally contracted out to a local contractor to complete the foundation, base slab and drainage. It was the same contractor bloke that kept on talking to me when we first arrived and wanted my address – see earlier blog (posted 7 March 2010). Anyway he got sacked because he cut corners by not putting in any lateral reinforcement to the foundation wall below the ground floor base slab. For the non-engineers: concrete is very good in compression (squashing force), but poor in tension (pulling apart). When you have a wall supporting anything, you need to have reinforcement the form of steel bars to take the tension forces, otherwise the wall will break. We found out that he did not put any lateral reinforcement (steel bars along the edges) because we were using a tractor to compress the soil under the ground floor, and the wall broke! It actually didn’t have any steel in it, when his contract explicitly said he needed to put steel in. So as a result, we (Mavuno) have to do the work ourselves, including rebuilding the wall.

Monday was spent re-preparing the slab for concrete. I say re-preparing as we actually started to pour concrete on Friday. But I happened to check the levels of the walls and found that the building sloped about 40mm from one end to the other. Hence, we had to do a bit of a Tanzanian botch job to correct the concrete we’d already poured on Friday afternoon. Then spent the whole of Monday re-positioning the forms and putting in marker pins so that the concrete is poured to level. The sacked contractor put the walls in place, but put them in using a 4-foot spirit level, hence over the 25-30m length of the building, the errors mount up. I was using a laser level to check, which is a lot more accurate. You may get the impression that we take 1 step forward and about 5 back, and you’d be right! It is very frustrating. It’s really hard to believe the locals when they say something’s ok, then you go back and check, and it blatantly isn’t. There are the core group of guys working here who you can trust, but some of the new people need a bit of chaperoning.

Tuesday was a hard and tiring day, as we continued to pour the slab. I was actually helping to lay the concrete and get it as level as possible. About 60% of the slab is poured, but it may be awhile before the rest is poured as we need more gravel. Now guess where the gravel comes from? Nope, it’s not from a quarry, but the locals collect rocks and literally sit and break them with a hammer! No joke. You quite often see groups of people making gravel on roadsides. There are currently a bunch of about 5 women making gravel on site. They get paid by the bucket full. I tried to get a picture of them doing it, but they wouldn’t let me take their picture. Though I will try and post a picture of some other gravel makers when we see some.

Tuesday evening was a bit strange. We ended up going to a funeral – well the burial bit of it. I had finished work and was heading home, but had picked up our washing and some milk from the Helsbys. As I got to the main road, there were loads of people heading the other way. It was the whole village of Kitongo going to the burial. Loads of people were telling me to come with them, and I tried to explain that I’d drop the washing and milk home and then come. I eventually got home and dropped everything off, then turned back to meet Esther and Lucy, who were waiting for me on the road. We caught up with the procession and followed it into a corn field. The men were at the top end of the field burying the coffin. The women just sat and watched on the side. We didn’t know what to do, so we just sat and watched. Then thankfully Dave and Becky arrived, and Dave and I went to where the men were. All the men had to be involved in the burial part. So what you’d see is people just shifting dirt around in between four branches that were used to mark the position of the coffin, as it had already been backfilled! So I took my turn with the shovel and shifted some muck about, then someone came and took it off me for their turn. The locals were all really pleased that we came and “took part”. When someone dies in the village, the whole village mourns for the person. There’s a big stigma about not dishonouring the dead, and respecting the “spirits of ancestors”. Many Africans claim to be Christians, but their lives actually reflect a syncretism between Christianity and animistic beliefs. Then you get the whole witch doctor thing. Won’t talk about witch doctors today, as we haven’t met any! I have met a former witch doctor, but that was just in passing. Anyway, after the burial bit, there was a eulogy of the person that died. He / she was 40 years old and had 4 kids. I’m not sure whether they were male or female as there are no masculine or feminine pronouns in Swahili like he or she! Dave was translating for me, but couldn’t tell. We walked back home with the locals, and they were so happy that we were there and were part of the village. Hopefully they’re accepting us wazungus more and more! There’s normally a period of mourning after the burial where no work is to be done as a means of paying respect. Wednesday was the day of mourning. They take is very seriously if you are found working. You get fined. Though organisations like Mavuno are allowed to continue working. The days of mourning can be a real problem during harvest time or planting time. Often the days of mourning can be three days long. Dave and Becky were telling me that in one village they were staying, people kept on dying during the harvest time, and the villagers couldn’t go into their fields to harvest. The harvest got spoilt and people literally starved. It sounds pretty ridiculous to us, but people out here fear offending any spirits in case they get cursed.

The rest of the week has been fairly quiet. I had a day off on Wednesday as it rained the whole morning, and only really cleared up later in the afternoon. Hence I was able to spend the day with Esther and Lucy, which was great. Thursday was Lucy’s birthday, but I was working cutting and planing wood for shelves for the store room in the first family house. Working with wood out here is always a bit more challenging than at home. Even just putting up shelves requires you to make batons from planks of wood (which are still green – they haven’t been dried!), and try and find a source of power for the tools – normally involves using a generator. Friday morning I actually got to place some of the batons that I’d cut the day before. Check out Lucy’s entry to see what we did the rest of the weekend.

Oh yes, forgot to mention about my hand. It is healing extremely well. So well in fact that I haven’t had to wear a bandage for most of the week, and have full mobility with it. Touching it doesn’t cause any pain, so praise God!

Lucy –The weather has definitely been on the change this week with a fair amount of rain during the days now as well as at night, and today has been positively cool; in African terms at least. I had to wear my fleece most of today, which is the first time since we arrived!

On Monday Baseki (our neighbour) came over for chai and a chat (well, as much chatting as I can manage on my very limited, but very slowly improving, Swahili). I do enjoy having her around to visit although conversation really is quite hard. Still, she is very patient!

On Tuesday Baseki’s brother-in-law, Kahabe, popped around. He is only 12 and he came around asking for “dawa”. He had managed to graze both his knees (“goti”) quite badly and so we put some antiseptic cream on them for him, and told him to come back tomorrow (“kesho”). He did come back the next day and after having had some more cream put on his knees he kind of just waited around looking at our kitchen table, which happened to have a couple of pens and pencils on it. It was all a bit odd really, but seems to be fairly common, particularly amongst the kids. I think partly they are intrigued to see how these white “wazungu” live, but also a part of them is kind expecting us to give them something. I did give him a banana, but still he waited. It was a little uncomfortable. He kept saying things, but I didn’t understand what he was asking. However, as we were about to go out we kind of made our excuses and he left. All a bit tricky really.

On Thursday it was my birthday (bizarrely enough it was Wayne’s birthday, and one of the Helsby children’s birthday the day before mine, so we’d had 3 birthday’s in 2 days) ! I had a really nice day, although obviously not the usual birthday things… no going to the cinema, the theatre or going out for a meal here! In the morning we had our usual Thursday morning kids ‘worship time’ at the Helsbys. All the kids get together and sing choruses and worship God together. As soon as I walked through the door they sung Happy Birthday, which was really nice. Then after the worship time I headed back home with Esther and Milka and her 2 orphan kids, Mariam and Jona. It’s becoming a bit of a tradition that they come over for chai on Thursday mornings. I asked Milka if she could see if Baseki wanted to come too so she came around and just as we were sitting down Velo, our home help popped around. She hasn’t worked for the last couple of weeks as at first she was not well and then her son, Paulo, was unwell too. So she was just coming around to tell me she would start work again on Monday. So I invited her (and Paulo) in too. So all in all there were 4 adults and 5 kids around for chai which was really nice. After they had gone I prepared lunch for the 3 of us and Wayne, who was coming to lunch too. He is the other volunteer out here at the moment. We had a nice lunch together and just chatted about life out here.

Birthday chai time

In the evening Becky had invited us all over for dinner. So we had a gorgeous spaghetti bolognaise followed by a big chocolate cake which they had made especially for me – which was lovely!! After dinner Lauren and Megan (age 6 and 4) performed their version of Happy Birthday whilst banging on saucepans with metal spoons – was very touching! The two of them had also looked through the things they owned and picked out things to give to me, as a birthday gift. I was really amazed at their kindness and generosity and also their willingness to give away their own possessions. The following morning Hitesh presented me with a small wooden cross that he had made himself for my birthday, from local materials. I love it!

Birthday cake

Singing Happy Birthday

On Friday I actually did some work!! I went out in the afternoon for a couple of hours, to measure out the existing water supply pipeline here. This runs from the pump house, where it draws water from Lake Victoria and then delivers water to the individual homes out here. At present it is only feeding a couple of homes and the compound/workshop/dairy area. In the future though it will feed more water tanks for more houses and is also likely to be used for irrigation of the fields of crops that Mavuno will be planting. Once I have all the data needed I am aiming to model the existing system, and I should then be able to advise them on future works.

Yesterday was cool, and a bit different. We went to a place outside Mwanza to visit Jana (who I had me on the Ladies Day that we had a Mavuno about a month ago), and her husband Dan, and two kids Grace and Silas. Jana had invited us over if we got the chance and the Helsbys were gong to visit their neighbours, and asked if we’d like to come with them to visit Jana. We had a really good day just hearing about how they came to be in Africa, (they’re originally from the States) and the kind of work they’re involved in. They’re living on an area of land which has been bought by the organisation they work for. On this land there is currently an orphanage housing 51 kids and a training college, training up locals to become pastors of churches. Jana’s husband is currently involved in planting new churches in the area. There is quite a big problem in Africa that many pastors of churches have very little knowledge of the bible and no training in it. This has led to some incorrect teachings becoming prevalent throughout Africa. As such, there is a real need for training in the bible for those who want to become pastors.

Whilst we were there we also got to spend a bit of time with some of the older kids, blowing bubbles, and playing in the sand pit and in the mud. We had a LOT of rain whilst we were there; hence it really was very muddy. It was good to see these kids, many of whom have simply been abandoned by their families, having so much fun with simple things like bubbles and sand!

Blowing bubbles

More bubbles!

Esther has been really good fun this week. It’s amazing to see her change and develop and learn to do new things. One of her new achievements this week is to try and make a moo sound every time she sees or hears one of the local cows. She hasn’t got it quite right, but it’s very sweet to watch her try!

Esther – I has been learning all about different animals and the sounds they make. Daddy and Mummy said that we’d hopefully see some lions soon, but for now I have this great book with lots of pictures. I have been practising the noises that lions make.

Esther practising her lion's roar!