Donkey (Nazo) and Mr. Iddrisu started the clean up from the gutter job this morning. They got most of the rubble hauled off and they moved several loads of dirt to other places on the property to help fight the erosion. They will have more of the same sort of work Monday when Dawda starts the project of raising the sidewalk.
This morning we were paid a visit from a widow lady who has a boy about 10 or 11 years old. She had come to the Child Center years ago when the child was a baby and we assisted her with food for the child. Today she brought us 6 guinea eggs and a plea to pay for the child’s education which includes school fees, uniforms, books and food money. School fees are something that we try not to put our hands in because it is a bottomless pit. Most of the villages have a local school that the children can attend for free but it is more prestigious to send their children to private schools. We thanked her kindly for the gift and gave her the money for her bus fare to go back to her village. We also gave her money for food and we gave the boy candy, chewing gum and cookies. They did not get what they really wanted but they did not go away empty handed.
We stopped to check on the van’s progress this afternoon. Gomda, the mechanic, said they got the engine overhauled and that he needed money to buy diesel so he could let the van’s engine run for the next 3 days to break it in and make sure that there were no leaks and everything was running well.
This morning we opened one of the store houses at the back of the property to get out the boards we will need on Monday to use for forms when they cast the new sidewalk. While we were walking around we noticed that the grass was very tall near the new building site so we went to town and bought herbicide; the Ghanaians called it “weedicide”. Donkey is going to spray tomorrow. Hopefully that will help get the weeds under control.
I bought some fabric a few days ago; several of the pieces had navy blue backgrounds. I try to wash all the fabric before I use it in a quilt because some of the fabric is so heavily saturated with dye that it takes several washing to get rid of all the dye. I try to do most of the fabric washing during the rainy season when we have an abundance of water. I have never had to wash fabric as many times as I washed this today. I ran the fabric through 8 wash cycles and still the water had a little tinge of blue. Poor Steve had to haul all the water out of the house and pour it in the yard because we do not want to overstress our septic system which is just a huge underground cement room with a soak away system. The fabric is out on the line drying.
The architect contacted us several times today with pictures of the plans for the training center. He had steps instead of a ramp. We want the building to be wheelchair and handi- capped tricycle accessible. He also did not have any hand rails in the drawing but other than that it looks pretty good.
Enjoy your day.
In HIS Service,
Steve and Kandie
