I broke my tooth and our roofer got arrested! Now that makes for an exciting day! At least my tooth is not hurting me. If it gets to hurting we will make a trip to Accra to visit the dentist. As for our roofer he was arrested for brawling. We have not talked to him about it yet but the best we can make out is that a toothpaste company in Accra sent a buyer to Yendi to buy charcoal. The company is making that black charcoal toothpaste that is supposed to whiten your teeth. The buyer buys charcoal until they get a full truck load and then the company sends a semi-truck to haul the charcoal to Accra. The toothpaste company is paying much more for the charcoal than the ladies can sell it for in the market. The market price is 90-100 Cedis a bag and the company is paying 150 Cedis per bag. The ladies that make charcoal in and around Yendi are very happy with their good fortune. People are cutting trees and making charcoal as fast as they can. This is very good for the ladies but it is very bad for the environment because the smoke is awful and the trees are not being replanted. It won’t be long before we will have a shortage of trees in this area. We do not live in a rainforest; this area is a savannah grass area. Our carpenter, Abochi , lives right across the road from where the buyers are set up. Yendi has a group of people called “The Concerned Citizens of Yendi”. The group is upset because the price of charcoal has gone so high and it is difficult for the poor people to be able to afford it. Besides, the vendors are not selling in the market so there is a shortage of charcoal. The Concerned Citizen’s group went to visit the buyers and was trying to get them to move to another community. Abochi believes that the women have the right to sell to the highest bidder and that the buyers should be able to buy from any community they want. Abochi and the Concerned Citizen got into an argument and Abochi was arrested.
I said all that to say that we still need a roof so this afternoon we talked to Abochi’s brother who is Abochi’s partner to see if he could go ahead and start the project. He said that the lumber truck had been repaired and that it had crossed over the river; it should arrive in Yendi tonight and they will start off loading it tomorrow. All the loading and unloading is done by hand. It will take them most of the day to get the truck unloaded. Abochi’s brother said that as the lumber comes off the truck he will select the boards he likes; then he will have the boards ripped to size. He said that we should have lumber on the job site by the day after tomorrow. He said that as soon as we get the lumber treated they will start putting on the roof. We sure hope that this works.
Dawda, the mason got the bathhouse door installed on the bathhouse at Kulkpeni today. We will pick up our tools, buckets and headpans when we go out tonight for evening Bible study. The seminar will be on us before we know it.
Have a great day!
In HIS Service,
Steve and Kandie
