April 30th, Making Progress

Making Progress, Exactly What Progress I Do Not Know

The last few days I have made some progress in the overall planning and some specifics. For me it takes a few side trips to get me back into the main road. My side trips were the re-writing of the letters to the archbishop and bishops that I left in Minnesota. With new thoughts and new information I have found since I have been here added to the letters. I went to print them this morning and we are out of paper. We are even out of used paper.

Micro Power Generation

The other night at the Internet Café I was looking for one thing and found another. I was looking for reference information on water pumps and found information on “The Micro-hydro Pelton Turbine Manual: Design, manufacture and installation for small-scale hydropower”. This is when you have a relatively small amount of water and relatively high elevation difference. You use the water pressure created by the high elevation difference to shoot a jet stream of water against a turbine. The turbine can be locally welded up and connected to the shaft of generator. Within a half a kilometer of here are probably close to a dozen generator repair shop that have generators with now engines. Depending on the water flow and elevation available you can produce a few hundred watts to several kilowatts. The reason this interest me is that the people of Kola have requested that we fix a broken borehole rather than the broken spring catchment system. They prefer the taste of the borehole water. So if we can convert the springs to micro-generation we could power an electric pump in the borehole to supply water to the village in greater quantities than the hand pump. When the tanks are full we can then use the power for fans in the school or other needs. The water after the turbine can be directed to drip irrigation systems or cattle trough or other uses other than drinking water. In college I studied Dam design and hydro power generation and in Haiti one project included small scale hydro-power.

Water for All Drilling System

I was able to download a slide presentation from Water For All. Tom Waller was in Bolivia many years ago and he combined a cable tool drill with a bailer and created a reverse flow mud percussion drilling method that works up to 50 meters. I showed the slide show to Adams and he said “We could do that. That will be good for small remote villages.” With some small modification it could also be used to clean out boreholes that have become clogged with fine sand and clays more quickly than with a bailer and without he cost of renting an air compressor.

NEPA and Cooking

National Electric Power Agency. NEPA is the nickname for the power company. They actually changed their name a few years ago but everyone still calls them NEPA. They are back working again here in Jimeta. Today we have power from around midnight to sometime before a woke up. Then we had power from 8:00 AM to 10:00 PM. The country cannot generate enough power for everyone to have power at the same time. They rotate power use. Every day seems different. Other than most days we it worked at all it ran from Midnight to early morning. I have the refrigerator running better now. I cleaned the coils on the back, opened the windows in the kitchen and set the ceiling fan medium speed. A thin layer of ice actually formed in the freezer. I keep a few quarts of orange juice, a bottle of water and a bottle of sun-tea in the freezer. So when the power goes off they hold the cold for a while longer.

Today is a sunny day, high thin clouds. I opened a small coconut and put the liquid in my rice pot with ½ cup of rice and some hot water. At 12:30 the rice was done and I had coconut rice for lunch. Not a lot of nutrition but it was filling and tasty.

May Day and Saturday and Sunday

Tomorrow is May Day and a national worker holiday. Banks and government offices are closed. Saturday they were going to drill at Pella Bible College (Air Hammer through weathered basement to 35 meters is the estimate). We planned to drive up there in the morning and come back in the afternoon. The driller is not going to be available. The Lutheran National Choir Competition starts today here at Jimeta and the finals are Saturday evening. Sunday is the special offering for the Bali Project. I have scanned our check and enlarged to about 30 inches with the amount converted to Naira and the account numbers changed. After they have their collection I will present the large and small checks to them.

Check Cashing

I have found out more about cashing foreign checks in Nigeria. They have two kinds of bank accounts. One can only work in Naira. The other can do foreign currency. Not many people have the foreign currency type. If you do not make a transaction at least every four months they close your account and you have to keep a minimum balance. The Bali account is a regular account. Checks are driven to Jos where an American businessman cashes them through his business account and gives the church Naira. Of course there are fees involved. Now I know the whole story. I guess we can make deposits into the US bank account for the business man and he can transfer it to his Nigerian account. It sure would be simpler if the LCCN would get an account for transferring of funds and cut out the middleman.

April 28, I Cannot Believe I Did That!

I Cannot Believe I Did That!

I spent so much time over the last months getting information about various technologies and I thought I has transferred it all to my new portable hard drive or to my hard drive on my lap top. But, I cannot find hardly any of the information from Sally’s desktop computer that I had used for most of the downloading. I will miss most is the drill designs. I will buy three hours of time at the café tonight and try to find some of the items I need.

I have 2 boy sitting in the window watching me type. They must really be bored. They are mostly blocking the little breeze there is. I have found out that wind is not in abundance around here. Wind energy may not be a useful resource in Jimeta.

Solar Cooking

So far my solar cooking has been mixed. Rice is pretty easy. Beans take longer. It has been overcast. Yesterday, we barely had shadows. Today is sunnier. I start on the porch in the morning and move the cooker off the porch by about 3PM as the building causes shadows. I have few spices and will have to shop for more. The curry powder (Made in England) I bought has little smell. I found some in the back of the cabinet that are made in USA that has some kick to it. Today I have rice and beans cooking. I am going to add some onions and maybe a can of sardines. Curried rice and beans with fish. I prefer canned meats. I will probably be sick of canned meats in a few more weeks. My cooking is not for the gourmet but it will keep me alive. With power I have oatmeal for breakfast. Otherwise Cheerios (Nestle version of Cheerios - 5 different grains). We had power from Midnight until 8 AM this morning. The water I had in the freezer was actually cold. I mixed in powdered milk and had a glass of cold milk for the first time. 4:30 not enough sun today the rice and beans are not exactly soft.

Power

We had no power for about 5 days. Power came on last night and again this morning. We had about 10 hours today. Almost enough to make ice. The Generator has back and forth to the repair shop. They keep changing part. They really do not know.

Bed net

The frame for holding up the bed net was attached in 3 places. The fourth would be where the ceiling fan is. I have been hanging my towel on the frame. When I grabbed it last night the whole thing came down. The three points were barely attached. I am glad I was not in bed at the time. It is heavy wood and would have left a big bruise.

April 25th Football, Bishop, and the Market

Saturday April 25, 2009

This morning the men started their football (soccer) game before 6:30. They had a referee and are quite skilled in both individual skill and team work. The pitch here is about the size of a U10 field but much wider. The goals are under trees and on the east end there are two large Neem trees in the field. Because the field is all sand there are no lines. The referee stood at about center and on the south side and whistled from there. I sat on the front step, drank my morning tea and watched. I shagged the few ball that came my way. Two days ago I tried to run to shag a ball from a kids game and realized that running with a bruised thigh on one leg and sore knee on the other did not work. Today it much better and I can actually jog a few steps. The bruise has turned a nice greenish purple but is much smaller than I expected.

Today is cleaning day. Some of these rooms have not had a good cleaning for a while. I man from the Deaf Center is here doing a good job. The big bedroom has not been used for a long time. The dust is thick as he sweeps the walls and window screen. The wind is blowing the dust back into the office/living/dining room that he has already cleaned. I took this picture as he was cleaning.

While he was cleaning, Bishop Edward Ishaya came over. We had some of my sun tea I made on Thursday with honey from Bali and talked. He related his first encounter with snow in St. Louis. He said the night got dark and then it got light again. He looked at the clock and it was still night so why was it so light out. He looked out the window and the ground was covered in snow. He went out and picked it up and it turned to water. The next winter he transferred to Luther Seminary in St. Paul. We mostly discussed farming. I learned that while he did grow up in Yola his father farmed several places as what we would call a share cropper. He had a plot that is now part of Yola Airport, another on the edge of the river and a third one outside of Yola. Today Yola has grown out past all the places his father used to farm. I gave him the 5 DVD set on Farming God’s Way and the information the catalogues from Luther Seminary bookstore.

In the afternoon, I trekked down the road and found two cleaners. The more expensive will have my clothes back by Tuesday. The cheaper one was not sure it depends on when they have power. I took the more expensive choice and came back with some laundry (N9.27833,E12.449907). I will have to wash my own socks and underwear. Later I trekked to the Market (N9.27674, E12.43682) about a kilometer down the road and found a small black pot that will fit nicely in my solar oven I am making with cardboard and aluminum foil. The first vendor I found wanted 800 Naira. I continued on and found the same pot for 350 naira. I got three carrots and some eggs I will hard boil. Tomorrow if it is sunny I will set out the bowl with rice, carrots and onions and some spices to bake in the sun before I go to church. For that last several years they have been building a new market. It is suppose to be done but no body is moving in. The rent is too high for the merchants. I will have to shoot some pictures so you can see the old market. (the Google Earth Photo of this area shows the old market in 2004 across the street. That was torn down and new one constructed the vender are all over the street and across the street from the old market back two blocks.)

I met with the Secretary and Treasurer of the Bali Committee and discussed several things. They would like to establish a health clinic and missionary center in the Bali area like the Catholics do. I told them that they need to talk with the LCCN Medical Board and the local government. I told them how the LCCN Medical Board has been cooperating with local governments to get medical clinics built and maintained with funds from the LCCN and ongoing staffing from the local government. They then told me that the Governor of Taraba State is from Bali and is a member of the LCCN. I told them that we should use those connections. They gave me a new listing of income and expenditures and we discussed how I would present the check on Sunday May 3rd. They liked the idea of scanning the check and making a big version on cardboard. After they have their special offering I will present the check.

April 24 Dr. Bongi's Funeral

Friday, April 24, 2009

Funeral Dr. Recab Eleazar Bongi

The Friday morning schedule was set for the Medical Board to meet at the LCCN Jimeta office (my home here) at 7 AM to go to Lemurde (80 Kilometers west of Jimeta past Numan, N9.60263, E11.78943) for the funeral. So I was surprised to see Mr. Bulama at 6:30 and Dr. Bille at 6:45AM. I was still having breakfast. The fact that they were ahead of schedules shows the importance of Mr. Bongi. That was the last thing that was ahead of schedule.

I drove with Dr. Bille to pick up the head of the medical board and then on to Numan. The Jimeta to Numan trip is now just over 35 minutes. Last year it took an hour. The worst section of the road has been repaired. At Numan we met up with Mr. Bulama. We left his car in Numan and proceeded to Lemurde. About half way there the car backfired and lost power. This is what I call a Lazarus car. It is one of thousands of Peugeot 504’s in Nigeria. Peugeot stopped making the 504 many years ago. The mechanics here keep raising them from the dead. The driver got out a screw driver and some emery cloth from the glove box. He took of the distributor cap and sanded the contacts. He fiddled with some other things and hand turned engine. Then we started the car and continued our journey to the Lamurde school grounds. Three sections canopies and hundreds of seats were set around the parade field. In the center of the field was an elaborate purple and gold, I guess you would call it an altar. The wind was whipping and the staff was working hard to keep it up. The post were dug into the ground and stacked with rocks. We decided to go to the far side of the field to a section of canopies which would have a nice breeze through them. The breeze lifted the two end sections of the canopies and flipped them out into the field. The jumped up and grabbed our section as it was about to head into the field. We then decided to move chairs under a canopy made by God, a large tree at the edge of the field.

Archbishop Babba and his wife were seated with the family and VIP section behind the podium. We trekked across the field to greet them. The Archbishop asked us to stay in the section set aside for the church and dignitaries, behind them. This was a much larger structure made of large steel tubing and steel crosswires. It was set on a slight hill so the heavy weight caused it to lean forward. I told the Archbishop to be ready to run. Because when the structure failed, it will fall right into the little canopy they were under.

The schedule had 10Am Corpse arrive at Lamurde family home compound and Lying in State, 11AM the Boy’s Brigade of Nigeria Parade Leads Corpse and Procession into LCCN Lamurde. At around Noon Bishop Edward Ishaya consecrated the school’s parade grounds as a holy place and for this day it was LCCN Lamurde. The Boy’s Brigade Paraded onto the field and then we waited as they realized that what they had practiced at the LCCN compound in Jimeta would not work here. After a lot of discussion and arm waving they planted some sticks in the ground to designate the points that the band and parade would turn. At this point Dr. Bondi was yet to arrive.

As the Family arrived in a large air conditioned bus the organizers realized that the family and VIP section was too small. A few minutes later a group of youth (teens and young men) came carrying a larger canopy section. This was a much sturdier canopy section. As the section we were in continued to lean forward until one of our posts was being supported by their canopy. I was amazed that it lasted throughout the service. Around 1:20 PM everything was set. And the Boys Brigade Honor Guard escorted the casket into the parade field with swords drawn. The entire Boys and Girls Brigades and national officers paraded by the casket at a funeral pace. Each pace was to raise the foot pause then finish the step. Then the band picked up the pace to a full march and they paraded by again at full pace with arms swing and knees raised high in the British style.

The church service started with hymns and bible readings followed by tributes. The MC for the event was trying to hurry everyone up. Most had prewritten speeches. The permanent secretary of the Adamawa Department of Education gave a speech that showed that the employees of the department really like their boss, Commissioner Bongi and they will miss his leadership. The longest speeches of course were from politicians. The Governor sent his secretary to give a speech which because he spoke lightly and away from the microphone no one heard. The Senator for this part of Adamawa had defeated Mr. Bongi in the primary election and he had then campaigned for her. She is the wife of his cousin. She gave a much more personal speech. The best tribute came from some children from the Remi Foundation Academy. A group of hearing impaired students sang a hymn in sign. Dr. Bongi had devoted his whole life to education. In his later years he established the Remi Foundation to give children with disabilities a better education. With the speeches over the sermon started around 3:30PM by the Dean of the Lamurde Division, Rev. Nelson Malau. An impressive sermon and short by African standards. The length of sitting and heat had taken its toll on my attention, not to mention that one supporting post for our canopy was leaning in excess of 30 degrees off vertical. The ending point of his speech was that we are re-born in Christ and Dr. Bondi had worked with Christ his whole life and now has died with Christ.

Following the sermon the Boys Brigrade and Band paraded past the casket and the honor guard escorted the casket to the grave yard for Interment Rites. We skipped this part along with many of the guest from far away. Mr. Bulama had hoped to leave Numan for Jalingo by 4 PM to attend a wedding in his wife’s family. He will not arrive until after dark. The lights on his Peugeot are a little iffy. If they work that is good. If they don’t be careful.

Solar Energy

One thing I wanted to do is get people interested in solar applications.

I started making solar tea. The first day was just a bottle on the roof of Mr. Bulama's van. The second day I found a shine bowl and set it up as a reflector.

Send Money Win Ice Creme

How much will Jay weigh when he gets home?

Announcing a fun contest to guess how much weight Jay will gain or lose during his ten weeks in Nigeria.

The rules are easy. Send a contribution to the Bali Committee along with your guess as to my weight when I return to Minnesota. Make check to Mount Calvary Lutheran with Bali Committee in the notes area. On a separate piece of paper write your name and phone number and what you think I will weigh in pounds (even pounds, no ½ or tenth) when I return in June. I will take the winner out for ice cream. In case of a tie I will draw a name.

Statistics: I weighed 214 on my bathroom scale the day I left. Last year I was at about 212 and returned after 8 weeks and visiting 100 villages I weighed around 195. This year I will be more administrative but will be here 10 weeks. I will going to a few villages. I will be working with the staff on staff development and program development. I will spend at least 2 hours per day on the computer. Last year I lived in hotels and the LCCN guest house and was served breakfast and dinner most nights (always more than I wanted). Lunches were in whatever village gave us lunch or if in a bigger city at a restaurant. This year I am living in a house on the LCCN compound adjacent to the Jimeta Cathedral. I cook for myself. So far I have been taken out to dinner once. I suspect this will happen again. I have not yet explored the area to see what cafes are in the area. We my host and I went out last Saturday to find breakfast we drove a few kilometers before we found a place. So I will probably be eating a lot of sandwiches. Canned meats that I find in the market. Powdered milk. I make sun tea most days and add some bush honey from Bali. Breakfast is quaker oats with honey and bread, orange juice. I will try to get out for a walk most evenings but have not yet made it out.

Send you checks and your guess to Bali Committee, Mount Calvary Lutheran Church, 301 County Road 19, Excelsior, MN 55331. You can give it direct to the Bali Committee at the table in the Atrium the first three weeks of May.

If anyone from the Bali Committee reads this please organize this effort at Mt. Calvary. I just thought it up today.

Prickly Heat:

Last year after a week in this high heat I started to develop a rash where I was spray insect repellent and had things rubbing (wrist, ankles and back of the neck). So last year I stopped using the repellent and the rash went away. Classic case of one plus one equals wrong answer. I did not bring repellent this year and now I have starting to develop the same itchy rash. I will see if the Danish engineers who will be leaving this week have any insect repellent they will donate to me. I am told that come rainy season this part of the compound is where the water puddles and the mosquitoes multiply. Too bad it is the wrong time of the year for Neem tree seeds. The oils from the Neem seeds are a natural insecticide and inhibit reproduction. The compound is filled with large Neem trees and not a seed in sight. (The Danes were at the compound today and I missed them)

Coincidence?

May 3rd is Bali Sunday at Mount Calvary Lutheran Church in Excelsior, Minnesota. We planned this in late February and early March this year and have continued to work towards this event. I was supposes to have been to Bali and back so I could relate a story to Mount Calvary via video and still pictures. This part of the program fell through. Tonight I meet again with Pastor Boniface and James the church and Bali Committee secretary. They told me as an aside to our conversation that the Sunday after next will be Bali Sunday at Jimeta Cathedral. After the regular offering and tithes are collected the offering buckets will be passed around again and the people will be asked to dig deep for the Bali Project. I got out my calendar and said that is May 3rd, the same Sunday that Mount Calvary is having Bali Sunday. Someone said that is quite a coincidence. James and I both said “ No” and pointed upwards.

April 21 LCCN Deaf Center

LCCN Deaf Center

After services on Sunday morning I visited the LCCN Deaf Center here on the compound. They were just finished with their Sunday School class. Seeing that I had a camera the continued the class with one more song in American Sign Language. Their teacher Ruth Ulea showed me the crafts that they make for sale in the market.
Ruth stopped at the office on Monday morning with a program for the 20th Anniversary of the death of Dr. Andrew Foster, (1925-1987). Dr. Foster was a black deaf American missionary from Fairfield, Alabama and a graduate of Gallaudet College. He is founding father of Deaf education in over thirty-five countries including Nigeria. His work established the Christian Mission for the Deaf. The Christian Mission School for the Deaf in Onireke, Ibadan State, Nigeria was established in 1963 as the Idandan Mission School for the Deaf.

The LCCN Deaf Center works in collaboration with the Christian Mission School for the Deaf. They average 20 to 25 students in their classes. They have two tracks for education. Some students will complete the basics of sign language and English then go on to the public schools for the Deaf that have full accreditation for primary and secondary schools. Other students are taught trades to make a living and sign language. Over the next month I will learn more. I think Ruth has decided that I should be educated about her operations while I am here.

April 21 An Accumulation of Stuff, Bali Delayed

Tonight I will send a couple of blogs. I have not been able to connect to the internet through the cell service. I am at City Cyber Cafe. A couple youth leaving the church helped me find a cafe. The first one we took a car cab to was closed so we got on motorcycles to this one.

Bali Trip

The Bali trip has been delayed for several reasons. The most important is the death of one of the church leaders. The funeral service will be Thursday and internment on Friday. Our visit would only have been for one day with two days of driving. Also no member of the Bali Committee could go this week. We will wait for Pastor Bunduka to return. Then go in May and include the weekend so the committee members will not lose as much time at work. We determined that it was more important to get members of the committee to Bali for more than one day than for me to go there for only one day. We will try to schedule a trip from Thursday through Sunday later in May. The Bali committee was supposed to be called together for a meeting Monday night April 20th. I will attend if it happens. Pastor Boniface was not sure if all of the phone calls were made to the committee.

For those of you that were on the 2007 trip Dr. Recap Bongi, PHD who was the former State Commissioner of Education and operated the Remi Education Foundation School for Special Needs Children died last week in India. He went there for treatment and they say he had large kidney stones which could only be removed by surgery. I am told they had trouble controlling his bleeding. He was a close friend to Mr. Bulama and an inspiration to many people. I will be attending the funeral with the Medical Board.

Now I will continue working on planning of the borehole rehabilitation and pump repair course and working on organizing the ongoing program. We may be going to Pella Monday or Tuesday to see the progress on the new borehole at that location.
I met Bishop Edward at the English service Sunday morning. He told me that the internet at the Yola Diocese secretariat is not functional. There is an internet café that I can use about a kilometer from here. I will have to use the café until they figure out why the system is not working at the Secretariat.

The Jimeta Cathedral Academy is going to be the first school in Nigeria to participate in the One Computer program. (I think that is the name of the program.) They have developed an inexpensive durable laptop with a screen that can be used in the sunlight. I think the original objective was a $100 laptop with basic educational software. The program is to get one computer per child. The program has failed in a few places when the teachers were not properly prepared or the community was not invested in the program and the laptops disappeared. There has been a team from Denmark (and one engineer from the USA) here this past week training the teachers on how to use this technology. The teaching staff is all new this year. They are starting new jobs, with student they do not know and now a technology that they had never thought they would be a part of. They started the training as a group of individuals and now formed a lot of new friendships as they have been taught to use this new technology. The education system here is old school. The teacher will speak and the students will recite and memorize. The computers are different. The students can explore and learn by doing and practicing using fun games and challenge their minds. The teachers were apprehensive that the students will catch onto the use of the computers sooner than the teachers. The teachers will continue to receive instructions for the next few months before any child gets one. On Tuesday the teachers will give a demonstration of the new skills they are learning for the parents. I missed the demo as I was working on the Gobal Health Ministries proposal.

The children are on term break until May. Football is a morning and evening activity the open area sandy area of the compound. They play a barefoot with a soft soccer ball. Their individual skills are very good but have little teamwork. I will get a picture of two of the goalkeeper who uses his flip-flops as gloves. He always laughs when he is scored on. They play with full size goals (two tree branches in the ground with a rope between them). No referees, no off-sides, a few large trees in the pitch. If the ball hits the wall it is out of bounds. The game stops for cars driving through the compound. If you have been on one of the trips here I am sure you have seen the games. It goes every evening.

First post from Jimeta

This is an accumulation of posts. I am using the Cell Phone internet by MTN it is very slow. It has taken over 15 minutes to get to this point. Now to see how long it takes to upload the post. It is 4:01 in the morning. The call to prayer woke me so I deciede to try this when the internet use is low. It really does not seem to matter.

53 Pounds

My bag was not full but had a lot of paper and ended weighing 53 pounds. International flights are allowed 50 pounds. Now my carry-on is a bit heavier and the bag is down to 49.5 pounds. I had an eight hour flight with a duet of crying toddlers as couple rows away. The man next to me was an urban planner from Perth, Australia. He currently works in Saskatoon, Canada. He moved to Canada in February. From the heat of the Australian summer to the middle of the Canadian winter. The free WiFi at Minneapolis and Amsterdam does not connect to the internet. But you can pay 3 euro for 15 minutes. I will save this and wait. There is a 7 hour difference here in Amsterdam. Nigeria is due south about 6 hours by jet. They are 6 hours ahead of Minneapolis time.

Park Place Hotel (N9.06566 E12.44847)

I arrived in Abuja about 7:30 PM Thursday evening. It is dark out. Pastor Benjamin the District Pastor for the Abuja District picked me up and drove me to the Park Place Hotel. Air conditioned and hot water. Two things I will see little of for a while. Had a nice breakfast of “oats” and toast. Oats is what instant oat meal is called. I will see a lot of that during the next two months. Pastor Benjamin picked me up and rather than going to a money exchanger he had money he needed to exchange for a doctor who was flying to America. So we did the black market money exchange in the hotel room. The official exchange rate is 149 naira to the dollar. The street rate is 172. We did 170. Last year it was at 117 on the street and 115 at the banks.
Do you know what the IRS does with our taxes? It runs an airline in Nigeria. I flew IRS Airlines from Abuja to Adamawa for a little over $106 and another $7 for overweight luggage. In country they only allow 20 kilograms (44 pounds). The flight was comfortable in Fokker F100 jet.

Thunderstorm and National Youth Conference.

Arrived in Yola at 3:00 PM on Friday to overcast skies. The LCCN Projects Manager Mr. Yakubu Bulama picked me up at the airport in his Toyota van. As usual he is Peugeot is at the mechanics. We inspected two places at the LCCN Jimeta compound and decided that it the accommodations at the Projects Office (N09.27996 E12.44847) would be the best. It is where I will be working for the next two months. Elisabeth lives here when she is in town. I have her dishes, generator and hot water kettle. There is a Propane stove and electric refrigerator that works when the generator is on or the National Electric Power Agency (NEPA) is on. I put a couple of bottles of water in the freezer to make ice for keeping things cold while we have no power. The power did come on at about 1 AM until about 6 AM. The LCCN compound is adjacent to the Jimeta Cathedral. The Lutheran Youth are having their national conference here through Sunday. So it is much busier and louder than normal. The evening meeting went until well past midnight. The music was loud and mostly fast African beats. A few slower European hymns tossed in. The main speaker reminded me of the traveling evangelist that held tent sermons in the Alabama when I was a kid. It was in Hausa so I did not understand any of it but it was loud and delivered with enthusiasm. Not your Minnesota Lutheran sermon. The thunderstorm started about 1:00AM. That cooled things down. Mr Bulama told me it is normal to get a little early rain then it stop for another month before the real rains come. It is amazing how much grass popped up on Saturday.

LCCN Academy for the Deaf

The lady that was cleaning the house I looked at prior to deciding it was too big and empty for one person to live in, is the head of a school for the deaf. She also runs a church service hear for the deaf. They have a tent for now but hope to build a building. Deaf children are brought here to learn the basics and then the ones that can afford it go on the state run boarding schools for primary and secondary school. Those that cannot afford the cost of boarding school are taught trades like jewelry making and sell their work in the market. I might be looking closer at this group in my spare time. They use American Sign Language. The Women’s Fellowship runs widows and orphans program that makes soap as a way for widows and orphans to earn a living.

Fuel Lines

Fuel cost $1.47 a gallon (65N per liter) at the National Petroleum stations. The waiting lines are several kilometers long. There are street vendors with 5 gallon containers who will sell it to you for a lot more. That is where we will get fuel for the generator. It is now almost too dark to type inside. I will have to quit and start the generator to recharge to batteries and cook some soup.

Saturday

Saturday was mostly a day of rest and organizing my accommodations. We drove to the market and several other places to get some essentials. I think my food will be a work in progress. I got instant oatmeal, Kellogg’s Fruit N Fiber cereal, a case of orange juice, case of water, tea and various instant soups. I found that I brought my charger for my electric razor but have not located by razor. So I bought some disposable. I forgot a towel so bought compressed cotton towel. They say it will expand out to a full sized towel when I get it wet. I will take a picture of this process. It is now approaching 6:00 and the light is starting to fade. I got to test the internet on MTN cellular. It definitely works but is very slow. Much slower than dial up or than the satellite system I used last year in Numan. I will probably be using the new satellite system at the Yola Dioceses to send my emails. Netzero has so much advertising content on its homepage that I will probably not check that email very often. I will use the jaycia@mchsi.com email mostly.

Bali Committee

We made contact. Pastor Boniface Shenmi the Vicar at Jimeta Cathedral and one of the Church elders Williams Nzomeh stopped by to talk. Progress is being made at arranging a trip to Bali early next week. We will have one or two members of the committee and the Missions Director Rev. Jamal Timusa, Mr. Bulama, myself and ten bicycles that the Yola Diocese has donated. Later a lady that was the former treasurer of the committee stopped in with a gallon of honey from Bali. She had just returned. The Women’s Fellowship has a companion church in Bali that they work with. Unfortunately, there is no Pastor and not much lay leadership.

That is it for now in four hours I will attend services at the Jimeta Cathedral.

I Leave Tomorrow

On No! I leave tomorrow. I am not even close to being ready. Why am I writing on the Blog?

Communications with Nigeria have improved the last few years. I have confirmation now that someone will meet me at the airport in Abuja and I have purchased a USB modem off the internet that should work with MTN cell phone to get very slow internet in Nigeria. It did not come with any software loaded so I have to spend a few hours on the internet getting updates to make it talk to Windows Vista and then add a new Dashboard. I cannot test it until I get there and buy a SIM card from MTN.

The trip to Bali is not firm yet. The pastor that runs the program is in Denmark. We hope to get the LCCN director of missions to take me out to Bali if his schedule is such that he can do it. I will find out that detail when I get there.

I will be staying primarily at the LCCN facility adjacent to the Jimeta Cathedral. They are finding me a spot in one of the houses. Elisabeth said I could use her generator for power so I can cook a little rice and oatmeal for meals. I am taking along some plans for solar cooking ovens and will find some cardboard and aluminum foil and make a solar oven to cook rice and make hot water for tea.

Nigeria 2009 - The Plan

This is my first note in my Blog of my Spring 2009 trip to work with the Lutheran Church of Christ in Nigeria. I will be leaving on Tax Day. The great national holiday for liars. My planned return is June 19th. My general trip plan is as follows:

1. Fly from Minneapolis to Abuja via Amsterdam on Delta/KLM.
2. Arrive next evening & spend night in Abuja.
   
3. Exchange money, buy cell phone and data card for computer in Abuja and, if time, visit geological society office for geological maps of Adamawa. Fly to Yola.
4. Meet with Jimeta Church Bali Committee and then travel to Bali for a few days of visits.
5. Return to Jimeta and prepare videos and pictures and stories for Mt. Calvary and Zion Lutheran Church presentations by the Mt. Calvary Bali Committee.
6. Work with LCCN Water Department and Project Manager to develop a pump repair training class. This will be the main work for the next month. Each week I hope to spend one day in the field and each weekend visit a different Diocese.
7. Help with presenting the pump class.
   
8. After the pump class I hope to spend time looking at future projects and work on some specific projects. The main project being the water system for the Gongola Diocese and if we can utilize a non-flowing spring that is 600 meters from the building.
9. Stop at Jos on way back to visit Women of Hope and restock with their merchandise.
   

That is the plan. It will probably start changing when I land in Abuja or maybe even before that.
Thank goodness that I am AADD and not Type A.