Solar cooking update

Got an internal rack made for the solar oven so we can have 2 levels of trays cooking at once, eg. meatballs and baked potatoes.

Lea has got used to putting the oven in the sun first thing when she arrives, and preparing the main meal before 9 to slow cook in the solar oven. Or if there's no food, at least she can heat the water for washing dishes.

On weekends I remind the day guard to get his food from the oven (usually a casserole, with rice or baked potatoes) himself at lunchtime if I'm late home or end up eating lunch out.

Several friends & acquaintances (including Lea and my landlord) have asked how they can obtain one, especially since lately there has been some delays refilling gas bottles.

2500 cards, 2500 pockets, 5000 pieces sticky tape, tubs&tubs of glue later ...

We had a professional theological librarian visit us earlier in the year and make some recommendations for IMS. One was to switch to a card borrowing service, and another to a professional library software so we could create the cards.

One step at a time ...  so I worked out how to use our current Excel list to creat the 2500 cards we needed using MailMerge.

I went into the cardboard sellers near the big market in town (horrendous parking) and got 2500 blue strips cut for making the pockets (she threw in a few extra) and large white cards for printing off 8 book cards per page.

For the last few weeks my day guard, IMS's secretary, a former student, the dean and his wife -- all have been cutting out white book cards and blue pockets, folding and sticking them together ... and we've had a few sessions of sticking in the pockets and inserting the cards in the library.

Our last session is tomorrow, by when I hope we will have half the books completed. They will have to finish the rest in my absence since I'm not supposed to drive close to leaving, and I'll be leaving for almost 2 months!  I'm back the weekend before Orientation starts in January.

Modifications & Additions at IMS campus

 As soon as we heard about a recent gift towards construction the builders were called in to expand what the campus could offer for our (hopefully) larger student body in the coming year.

 Since we'll have 2 classes from January 2013, we need 2 classrooms. The big classroom has been subdivided along the foundation where my inital plan had provided for an eventual conference room+Director's office to make a small classroom. The other remains medium large.

 We had added a storeroom on the bottom of the water tower structure (no use letting good foundations and frames go to waste). Then we added an outside kitchen for preparing students' food to that ... and then it was decided one storeroom wasn't enough so added on to that!

Water still hasn't been running properly, so our FIA friends had yet another look at things, and this time it seems that we have to change the type of generator (we've changed the generator, the pump, the pipes, ...)

 Our new site supervisor and dean of students isn't too comfortable with our western-style teacher's house, so we are building him an african-style house (outside kitchen and bathroom) with extra room for his large family.

We have started another unit that could be for a couple/family (has a door in the interior wall) or 2 singles' rooms .

Dinner for 17

With the new academic year at the evening Evangelical Bible Institute of Ouagadougou starting and a few new students I invited them to my place for a meal.

14 of the 17 turned up, but with me, my dinner helper and my guard looking after all the visiting motorbikes and car we made 17.

I had 3 fans going in my small lounge where we chatted, laughed, and ate pumpkin soup, pasta salad and meatballs, and banana cake and custard.

I'm leaving the re-arranged furniture as is since I have to fit much of my bedroom furniture in here for when they dig up the floor next Tuesday.

English, anyone? English for Everyone

With Alison's absence overseas for a few weeks, I'm teaching her class in our "English for Everyone"  programme twice a week.

Again we had nights of testing for new students, again waiting to see which of the former students wanted to sign up for the next level, again resulting in long waiting lists of those who didn't get in. Some of those offered spots haven't turned up, so classes of 22 or 18 have become 14, much easier to handle in the small rooms. We have 7 levels this term, the highest working on poetry, the lowest on how to say "Hello"!

If we had more teachers we'd be able to offer more classes (we can spread out to the upstairs level), so if you'd like to teach English for 3 months or more in a French-speaking African country, let us know!

No special training necessary since we provide full course materials, just an ability to explain our complicated language in uncomplicated terms.

Solar oven cooking

After we used their solar ovens in Benin, Janet and I bought our own from the Centre Liweitari project and squeezed them into the car. (We also bought lamps they made there). I have tried various home-made solar oven experiments during my years in Africa, but this one gets much hotter.

Since then rain has eased up a bit and we've been able to use the oven occasionally for our mid-day meals. Leah and I have been working on a new range of recipes to use in the cooker and anticipate free outdoor cooking during the hot season.

We brown the meat on the normal stovetop, then put rest of the ingredients with it in a black pot to 'slow cook' during the morning.

Rice cooked in the stainless steel bowl with a black lid (provided with the stove) takes only a few hours, especially near noon, and comes out fluffy and with a great flavour.

Flooding from below, flooding from above, flooding from on high.

It seems funny to be thankful that the rain has stopped ... but I am!

My spare bedroom/library has had puddles of water every time it rains, even after we fixed the roof. Seems that it is coming in at the junction of floor and external wall, and up through the foundations through cracks in the cement floor.

I have been packing up my books, airing out the mouldy-smelling pillows, will have to die my new briefcase (mould turned the green surface black in spots), and am looking for friends with dry spaces to store my stuff as the owner looks at fixing it.  I'm just waiting for his increase in rent (a frequent suggestion) if it costs him anything. Of course he'd have to do a good job for that to happen, so we'll wait and see! If it's too much I'll seriously consider moving, since we've had lots of problems lately with the house, and so far SIM has paid most of the maintenance.

Last week I had water on my desk next to my computer, on the phone, on my bed ... and the roof has already been repaired three times this rainy season. The house is getting so old that patching up the stuff is not working any more.

Benin #3: Parakou

Getting used to driving Benin-style again was easy: add lots of honking and weaving between cars and motorbikes!  I drove a lot of the time we were in Parakou, a very busy town, since I knew the route and destinations. There were more paved roads and traffic lights than when I lived there almost 20 years ago but the main roads were in a worse state and more crowded than when I regularly visited there 10 years ago.

Janet & I stayed with friends of hers on the SIM property on the northern side of town. The site was peaceful except for the timber yard which unloaded heavy logs at 5 am and 11pm!

We made the 20 min trip into the centre of town and/or out to SIM's offices on the southern side each day. I got to catch up with old friends, both African and missionary, and also do a little publicity for IMS.

We bought some local specialties, like chopping boards (good wood is scarce in Burkina), and cards and jams from the monastery where we had a long walk.

The stay was short (2 1/2 days) before we had to hit the road back again!

Benin #2: View from the roof, Natitingou

 The house we stayed in had 2 side sections with flat roofs: a great spot to read, relax and catch the view early in the morning (above) or late in the afternoon as the sun set (below), and hot enough during the day to cook things well in the solar oven (bottom left of photo).

 Our nearest neighbours just a little down the hill were Kristie and Johann Bayne and their 3 boys. I knew Johann originally as one of the missionary kids (MKs) in Benin, and Kristie met him when she came from my church in Springwood for a short term teaching school.  Johann's parents live normally in another house on the site.

Benin #1: Resting near Natitingou

Janet and I spent 10 days at Centre Liweitari in the hills around the northern town of Natitingou, Benin.

We arrived planning for 7 days there and 7 days in Parakou (my old hunting grounds) but it was so calm and restful we almost immediately asked to extend our stay.

 In the afternoons we walked along the brook in the valley below (photo of the centre taken from there)

We got to stay in the house of missionaries currently in Europe so had all the mod cons. It had a flat roof with a great view of the valley (see next post for photos) and solar ovens, which we ended up ordering from their project.

With the rain and sun we've been having lately there's been some lovely flowers in the gardens. This one, a little lily as they call it here, is a reminder of the truth of Matthew 6. 

Gearing up for graduation

• _x_ Buy material for matching outfits. Fit into budget.
• _x_ See who wants extra material for matching skirts, wives etc and get their payment 
• ___ Decide on tailor and get fittings for everyone. Committe decided we're not doing embroidery since too complicated last time.
• _x_ See embroiderer and get embroidery done after all, since 'past years had it and we want it'.
• _x_ Grade all outstanding papers so only last class' group presentation to do at the last minute.
• ___ Grade final presentations, printout calculations of totals and get to Josiane for reports
• ___ Help Josiane with computer calculations and printout of report cards
• ___ Print out certificates with my inkjet in colour once total grades are in
• ___ Create a souvenir dvd full of files for students including photos
• _x_ Organise a present for the graduating students
• _x_ Do layout for the afternoon programme
• ___ Transport out whoever or whatever needed, going slowly because of bad shock absorber

A dining room to rival a maquis

IMS students currently eat their meals on the teacher's verandah, and are prepared in their kitchen, but that's not the ideal longterm situation, so a new dining room is being built .. local style. Next step is a small outdoor kitchen.

 It should also be useful as a breezy lounge, or a  group meeting area.

Stay tuned for photos of the final product

Hoping for … wall, teacher and student housing, …

We’d like to plant more trees and a garden to help with student food supply. This is waiting until we get funding for a wall that will also serve as security, and for our other construction projects. Currently for the few trees we’ve planted we’re using temporary measures to protect young plants against the donkeys, cattle, goats and pigs that wander freely through the property.

We would like to hire a qualified missions professor as assistant director later in the year and his family will need accommodation, as will the families of students arriving for the new 3 year Bachelor degree course.

The plan is for another house opposite the Dean of Students’ house (photo), currently shared by them with students for a dining room and kitchen facilities.

Several two-room apartments are planned for student family accommodation.

In the longer term we will need another classroom or a library building so we can use the current library as a second classroom.

The site will be getting full!

Working on … water tower and supply

Still waiting on running water as a concrete tower is built to house a plastic water tank. Pipes have been laid awaiting completion. A generator will pump the water from the deep well 200m away to the water tower once a day to fill it, and gravity will do the rest!

Adaptation and evolution ... of student dorms

First it started out as a storeroom and kitchen, with an outside loo and bathroom for visitors and staff. Then a shed was added on the end to house the solar batteries. Then two more identical rooms and bathrooms .. and hey presto! A student dorm!

Since the rooms aren't that big (actually about the same size as my dorm room in Bible college) a screened verandah was added as a lounge room.

We coped with the fact that we then didn't have a storeroom and kitchen by storing some stuff in the solar battery room and are now closing in part of the bottom of the water tower to be a storeroom. For this 6 month course Suzanne from Cameroon is cooking while her husband Luc teaches, so she's using her own kitchen in the teacher's house. We're thinking of maybe building a paillote (straw-roofed outside shelter) with a small kitchen for dining and outside seating facilities, similar to the local cafés.

Completion … of classrooms, admin and library

Inside is bright, cool and airy. And so much more roomy than our last place!

Some visitors asked why our classroom was so big. Several answers:
- It serves as a meeting room when we have lots of visitors for graduations etc. so needs to accommodate about 100 people seated,
- there are actually foundations ready to close off part of it eventually for a conference/group room and director’s office once we develop more (ie. Have built a second classroom or a new library where the current library will become a second classroom), and
- we’re thinking of the future when our classes will grow!

We had to have several additional shelves built for the growing library.