T.I.A.

The Tuesday evening of our big introduction to Pommern, we received our volunteer assignments for the following day. One person would be needed at the clinic, three at the construction site, and.... one to go to the secondary school for some sort of lesson or conversation with the 20 or so students who remained on campus during break.

I jumped at the chance to go to the school, Kendra jumped at the chance to go to the clinic, and the remaining three were planning to work construction. I went to sleep that night eager yet apprehensive about my task for the following day. Despite being a teacher by profession in the U.S., I knew I was stepping into brand new territory in Tanzania. Now, in the U.S. if students had to attend lessons while on break, there would be a revolt. I supposed the reaction would be different in Pommern, but I was still interested to see how things would work.

The following morning (Wednesday), however, plans fell through for my teaching assignment. T.I.A. This Is Africa, a phrase a couple of my teammates coined. Right along with the concept of African time is the concept that making plans of any sort in Africa is a foolhardy task. Things change, plans fall through; but it will all work out, no worries, hakuna matata. So I ended up changing clothes and going with Amy, Jack, and Sonia to work at the construction site.

The experience turned out to be a very good one, though definitely exhausting work that led me to taking several ibuprofen pills before bed that night! The current construction project that Global Volunteers was assisting with in Pommern was building a new kitchen at the secondary school to replace an older, poorly ventilated one (see the picture inside the old kitchen, posted in a previous blog entry, here). The new kitchen will also be right next to the dining hall, as opposed to the opposite side of the campus from the dining hall where the current one is located.

Our first task of the day was to help carry 12-foot long 1x6 boards from a Roman Catholic supply yard down to the school, a distance of maybe 3/4 of a mile. We had a number of secondary students helping carry boards also, all of whom did so with ease, girls carrying a board apiece on their heads and men carrying a board apiece on their shoulders. We wazungu struggled to carry one board per 2 people...and earned plenty of laughs from the local men working at the supply yard as we got started!

Sonia and I carrying one of the boards along the red dirt road (photo taken by Edward)

Later, Amy and Sonia tried to carry the boards mwaafrika (African) style. They decided
it was a bad idea without the use of a kanga wrapped up on their heads as padding!
(photo taken by Edward)

After making 2 trips apiece with the boards, we spent the rest of the morning helping build one of the brick walls of the kitchen. Working alongside two local men named Moses and Godwin, one of our tasks was to mix "cement," which was simply sand and water, that would become the mortar to hold the bricks together and carrying it in buckets to the wall. The bricks had previously been made from a mixture of red mud and water, baked in an oven, and laid out in the sun to dry. We also helped with the physical building of the wall, as well as carrying brick after brick, one or two at a time, to the work area.

Sonia and Amy making cement later on during our time in Pommern (photo taken by Edward)

It doesn't sound that difficult writing about it now, but believe me that I found it tough work in the African sun. (It was winter in Pommern and typically the air temperature was cool due to the high elevation, mid 50s-mid 60s during the day, but always a striking difference in how it felt depending on whether we were in the sun or in the shade. That particular day ended up being warmer though, and the sun shone all day making it feel even hotter.)

Jack continuing work on the brick wall the following day (photo taken by Edward)

The kitchen as it looked on our penultimate day in Pommern, after the walls were all
finished, the boards were put to use, and the next step would be constructing the roof.
The dining hall is the building to the right.

By the time 12:30 and chakula cha mchana (lunch) rolled around, we were tired, hungry, and thirsty indeed! All the work done was by hand. No power tools, no trucks or machinery. Buckets and shovels were the extent of our tools. I watched Moses use a rock in place of a hammer. An old window frame was used for scaffolding. By opening up the windows, the frame stood up on its side and was balanced by the windows. A lot of manual labor by very strong local people whose job it is to continue building each day, along with the help of a few Global Volunteers and occasionally some students, and by and by the job will get done!