Blocks, mesh and electrician…

Three hours I waited for the electrician to arrive on site this morning… Yesterday I had been told that he would be there at 9am, so at the agreed time there was I waiting for him.

He didn’t show up until 12:30 and both Ntate Sello and I were both wondering of he would ever show. During this time however I managed to alert them for a small problem that was happening on the erection of the retaining wall.

Yesterday (late in the afternoon) we had received some blocks so today they had started the wall. They had not looked at the drawing/detail that I had issued them and so a small problem was arising. They were having difficulty in building the wall without continuous vertical joints in the pillars! It was easily solved by building a model (which I have just discovered is even better than a 3d sketch) with bricks so that they could easily understand how to do it.

With that done I continued the site inspection and was happy to see that block A is now nearly ready for the slabs.

Before the electrician arrived we received more blocks and steel mesh that we will need for the retaining wall and the slabs. The reinforcement for the ring beam will arrive tomorrow. But due to a lack of communication the round sections will not be pre-curved! We will have to do it on site… The drawing that I had given them did not have the radius or the diameter of the rondavlos (because it was not constant) but for material order the dimension of Ø6700 would have been good enough! They didn’t ask, I didn’t know, we didn’t order… so now they will just have to bend them on site! Not to difficult Sello tells me.

The Electrician eventually arrived and we discussed where to put the new conduits and where the switches were going to be located, and where these conduits had to go… He was not 100% fluent in English so I guess I might have to keep an eye on it to be sure that it all ends up in the right places. Ntate Linakane, drove him to the site and after went off to the meeting with the village chief to see if he could sort out our stone shortage problem.

However before he left I asked him if he could set up a meeting with the Thatch roof specialist so that I could discuss the details with him. Once this is done a crucial part of the project will be on its way and I can focus on some other issues like the children’s decorative panels, which not only will be nice but a lot of fun to make (for both children and me!).

I had a meeting with the students about Lydia’s house but one of them (the one that had the drawings to print) didn’t show up, so the meeting was postponed for tomorrow. I need to squeeze them a bit to get this one also moving… Up to know I’m the only one working for it and that is not how it is supposed to be!