Last Week November 20 to 27

Last week was a lot of office work and strategizing. The week started with the first Deaf service in the Church For Deaf. On Sunday November 20

Singers before the service. It is traditional here to have singing before the formal service begins as people come in. At the Cathedral I can hear singing up to a half hour before the 8 AM service.

Pastor Ruth Ulea rings the bell three times. In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, to start the service. As mentioned the Dedication posting. The bell is an exact replica of the bell used at the Copenhagen Deaf Church to start their service.

Pastor Ruth's Sermon

 Following the service they make the announcements. If you make them at the beginning you will have some people not arrived yet. Just like in the US there are people arriving late. During the announcements she told the congregation that they have been invited to participate in the Annual Thanksgiving/Harvest service at the Cathedral on December 4th. The Committee organizing the event has decided that the Church For Deaf should contribute 100,000 Naira for the festival. When they do not have visitors the weekly offering is under 1000 Naira. So the committee has decided that they can afford 2 years of offering.

When I saw the letter I just laughed. I told Pastor Ruth that the comma after the 100 should have been a period. They were only asking for 100 Naira. She just rolled her eyes at my joke. 

After the service is a chance to socialize before they head their separate ways.  

On Tuesday we went back to Demsa to visit with Doctor Stanley to discuss the placement of the proposed Training Hall and Accommodations Hall and where to put the demonstration latrines. We started with the latrines.

 Doctor Stanley wants renovate the existing two hole open pit squat latrine into a Ventilated Improved Latrine. Currently it is an open top latrine with two sections over a large diameter pit.

 It is getting full and the holes are too small to be used for pumping out. The walls and slab will be removed. They will hire a truck to come and vacuum out the pit. Then they will build the pit walls higher by a meter and build an new foundation and slab, that will have proper sized and shaped holes for a person to squat and defecate and urinate at he same time. Since this is suppose to be a demonstration of what could be built in a remote village the walls will not be built of concrete blocks but could be built of wood and galvanized metal with a galvanized metal roof. The other half may even be walls of cornstalks tied together or weaved grass mat walls. This will end up being a raised VIP Latrine, demonstrate what you do when there is hard rock and you can not dig a deep pit or a high water table.

Another demonstration latrine will be built a little closer to the area for the families of the people in the In-Patient Ward. It will be a double vault composting latrine to demonstrate what has to be done when you cannot dig a pit at all.

Doctor Stanley then showed us the area that he thinks will be the best place with the least interference with clinic operations. It is on the east edge of the property.

The site will need a road made which it major disadvantage but the road will also service the generator building and might be built with funds from the renovation project. There are items of construction that will benefit both projects. The drilling of the new industrial borehole will free-up the current borehole to have a hand pump installed and used as a day use pump and used to training pump repair technicians. The VIP latrines are to be used by visitors and families of the patients. The center needed a road to bring fuel and service the generator and it can pass by the training and accommodations halls.

 

 After finishing discussing where the building would be located Yakubu and I went up to the new borehole site. 

View from the borehole back to the water tower and In-Patient Department. Sometime in the future water tanks will be built near the pump to provide additional water pressure. This is near the highest point on this section of the property.

This is a panorama from south to north. You can see the water tower over Yakubu's head on the right side of the picture.

 That evening I started water boiling and went back to the bedroom to type up notes. When I went back to the kitchen the big bottle of gas for the stove had run out. I got out my 2 Kilogram bottle and attached the burner to finish dinner.

I still had some of the chicken left that I bought Saturday. So I cooked up some chicken ramen noddles added some extra spices and some chicken parts.

The next day I took a walk and went by a dealer or stoves and told him I would like to connect my small bottle to the big stove but the fitting were different on the regulator for the big tank and the where the burner screwed into the little tank. He said no problem the dealer next to him has the solution. He had a regulator that screw into the little tank and I just move the gas hose to the new regulator. The Batura price was only 3000 Naira.($7.50).  Of course the following day the little bottle ran out of gas too. But the dealer had told me where the cheapest price for gas was so I got it filled for 1000 Naira. Now I have enough gas to probably last me through the next trip.

When I went to check on  my solar cell for my lamp that was outside recharging on a plastic chair on the porch. A tiny Praying Mantis jumped off the chair. I got my camera and this is the best shot of him or her climbing back up the leg of the chair. The picture to be true would be rotated 90 degree. 

The main activity for the day on Thursday the 24th was the election of the new Archbishop of the Lutheran Church of Christ in Nigeria. The General Council Meeting was happening at the Cathedral in the adjacent compound. The delegates had been seated, accredited and nominations had been completed before I made my way to the balcony to watch.

 The top three nominees would move forward to the first vote. The top nominee was Rt. Rev. Dr, Musa Filibus the Bishop of the Mayo Belwa Diocese and former Director of Development for the Lutheran World Federation. In second was Most Rev. Dr. Nemuel Babba current Archbishop. In a distant third was Rt. Rev. Amos Bukata the Bishop of Arewa Diocese.

 The vote and counting took well over an hour. They were two votes short of the accredited delegates count. Finally, the decided two people had left. The first vote eliminated Bishop Bukata but neither Bishop Filibus or the Archbishop had the 2/3 vote of the delegates to win. Bishop Filibus had a large lead. During the second vote I went back to the house and got on Facebook. I noticed that some people were congratulating Bishop Filibus before they could have counted the votes.

When the votes were counted it was Rt. Rev. Dr. Musa Filibus that had been elected the next Archbishop. He will be consecrated at the next LCCN Convention in February.

The Archbishop graciously congratulated the Archbishop elect.

This was Thanksgiving back home. Tradition is turkey, second helpings and leftovers. I followed tradition.

 One exception to traditions. I was cooking in the dark with the light from my Ikea solar lamp. The flash photo makes it look a lot lighter than it was. I have two burner going. One with rice,onions, peppers and spices. The other with the leftover beef ramen for the previous night. This is not the leftovers that are traditional.

 When the rice was nearly cooked down I added the water from the can of turkey I brought from home and then when that was boiling added the turkey and cooked it down.

The only thing I forgot was to have the Crasins I brought with for desert. I had them in my oatmeal the next morning. I had plenty of leftovers. Friday night was the same meal but with power and light.

Saturday night I was thirsty for a Schweppes Bitter Lemon and went out to the local stores that sell beverages. I did not find any to I bought some Malta. As I left the second store I saw a vendor with a pushcart filled with plastic sandals or flip flop. I bought a pair that said Nike for 500 Naira. I love it when they start to say one price realize they are talking to a batura and a higher price emerges. But at Only 500 Naira ($1.25) I did not haggle. The flip flops I had been wearing around the house were several years old. They had broken last year and I had sewn them back together. The first week I was here the left foot toe strap I had sewn back on broke again. I had been flopping around with these for a couple weeks.

Well that was my week. It is now late Sunday Night. I have 10 days left in Nigeria. We will be getting copies of the plans for the Training Hall and Accommodation Hall out to contractors this week and hopefully get the design of the VIP Latrines to the review point. Time for a cool shower and bed.