Day #2 of the wall project is behind us! The masons actually have one of the small sections built to its full height and they have the hanger installed on the top of that portion for the razor wire! We are making progress! Dauda, the mason, is still struggling with the grates. Fortunately, Red is helping us with this portion of the wall; he understands the process but this morning before Red got to the jobsite Dauda told me that we could not use any of the boards we used on the last project because they were too wide. He is trying to build a trough to go around the grates on the top edge. He wanted us to go to the lumber company and buy all new boards and have them split to the size we needed. What? I took a couple scrap pieces and showed him how he could use the wide board for the bottom of the trough and shift the side boards to any width he wanted! As soon as I showed him, he had an “A-ha” moment and he was all smiles when he realized there was another way to put the boards together! This is the same man that hung the double gates upside down and could not figure out why they kept falling off the pin hinges and were not flush in the middle!
We started pulling blocks from Red’s house this morning. We have plenty of blocks at the mission house but they are for the toilets. Red was supposed to hire a man to sit at his house and load the blocks in the motor king and Mr. Iddrisu was supposed to drive back to the mission house and the masons were to unload them. Red’s man was a no show yesterday and today so we sent a couple of masons to Red’s house with Mr. Iddrisu and they loaded the block and then rode back and unloaded them. Whatever it takes to get the job done!
Zorash and I went to the bank in Yendi this morning to try to get change for the 100 Cedi notes that we got last time we changed money. Imagine the bank in Yendi had no 1 Cedi notes or coins; no 5 Cedi notes and no 10 Cedi notes! It is just crazy that the banks have no small bills! We need them to pay the workers for their labor as well as give them their chop money. We took what we could get which was 50 Cedi notes and 20 Cedi notes.
Paul, the guy that we buy formula and baby cereal from, came to Yendi today so Steve made a trip to town to get it. Mr. Hayes, the pharmacist, had gotten a few more cases of liquid vitamins for the children so Steve made another trip to town to get those. He thinks that he has enough packed down to last for the next 3-4 months.
Take care and please keep us and the work in your prayers; especially pray that the workers stay safe!
In HIS Service,
Steve, Kandie and Skeeter
The Monkeyshines
While Mom was in town with Zorash and Dad was in the Child Center working, I was playing in the big mango tree. I don’t know how I did it but I got myself so tangled up in the upper branches that I could not get down! I tried and tried. Mom tried to talk to me and get me to unwind myself but I was too far gone! I could not concentrate on her instructions! A lot of the time Mom can talk to me and I will hold the leash and follow it and get untangled but today it was a twisted mess! The leash is long; about 15 to 20 feet long so if I go high up in the tree the parents cannot reach me without a ladder. Today Mom had to climb up in the tree to reach me! She looked so silly! A 70-year-old fluffy woman, barefoot, long dress tucked into her pantaloons, hugging the tree with one arm trying to free me with the other! I was happy to see her coming to my rescue! Dad was on the ladder; they finally got enough of the leash untwisted that Mom was able to reach the clasp. Mom then handed me down to Dad and he put me in my condo. The leash was still twisted up in the upper tree branches but Mom could not safely reach it so Dad got the battery-operated reciprocating saw and Mom cut the offending branch down. When it fell it got stuck so Dad had to get back on the ladder and pull it down! Yikes! That was enough excitement for one day! I am no worse for the wear!
The parents found another baby hedgehog when they went for their walk! It was down in the gutter wandering around; it must have fallen into the gutter because there was no way that it could get out by itself! Mom insisted that Dad get down in the gutter and catch the little guy. Well, you know the saying “no good deed goes unpunished”! The hedgehog crawled under a plastic bag; Dad picked up the plastic bag only to discover that it had been used for poop! Yes, human poop! Most of the people in our area do not have toilets or pits or outhouses so they poop in plastic bags and throw them in the open gutters; they do not usually have toilet paper either so they use plastic bags, leaves, paper and sticks to wipe with; these items are many times thrown into the open gutters. Dad was beyond annoyed and disgusted when he got poop on his hand. He did the best he could to wipe it off on the nearby foliage. Fortunately, we were less than a block away from the mission house! They let the hedgehog go in the yard; maybe he will be safe in here! I personally am not going to try to get friendly with him! You know those things are prickly! They could hurt you if you decided to try to play with them!
Hedgehogs are for looking at, not playing with!
Love, Skeeter
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