Just Tuesday

The first highlight of this day was an adorable pre-school performance
put on especially in our honor. About 60 children sanf and danced,
smiling ear to ear, while Sister Juliette did the calling and
drumming.

From there, Ed and Jim met Sister Bernardi to discuss needed stove
repairs. This Sister is in charge of the kitchen and has a list of
needed improvements, only one of which is the biogas supply. Jim was
interested in attempting a concrete repair to one of the hearth
stoves, thinking of using his masonry skills from previous work in
Tanzania. Ed agreed to append the to-do list, hoping to get some
insight into how to undertake a small repair project in this setting.

All four of us met up again at BCDC to lead a meeting with the local
Water Board, a citizen groupinterested in improving village water
sources. About 10 were in attendance, and again provided Erin and
Connor with helpful informationabout the water sources. These two
water engineers and Jim then spent several hoursriding boda bodas (or
piki piki, we are not sure which is the best word for them) to
investigatethe locations, sometimes winding along narrow footpaths and
covering some distances.

Ed spent a good deal of time coordinating the purchase of a bag of
cement from Karaguzza. It also appeared that getting the sand for the
mixture would be anotherset of logistics. The "sand" used by locals
was a clay loam with some sand in it... the clay content was sometimes
compensated for by using extra Portland cement. The outcome was often
poor quality and low strength. This will be remembered as a valuable
insight for the time when construction begins.

As planned for the rest of the week, we all joined Tusabe, Michael,
and Moses at BCDC for dinner. It evidently often takes 4 hours or more
to to prepare a village dinner in Uganda, so we ate around 10 pm. The
wait was worth it, as we passed the time with good conversation and
the meal itself had 5 different delicious dishes. Afterwards, Tusabe
told us of a man from his village named Busaka who is revered as a
living god for his healing powers. His many followers, in three
countries, sell their possessions and give the money to his church in
hopes of earning favor and opportunities for a healing touch. No one
in the room took this man seriously, and we swapped stories of faith
healers in the United States that sounded similar.