W U 20 may

Good Day All,

 

Today is National Day. Cameroon got its independence in 1960 and May 20 is their national holiday. There is a big parade downtown most of the day and all kinds of other things. We live fairly close to the military airport so I got to see the big airshow yesterday. Cameroon is not known for its air superiority. Their entire arsenal is 3 French fighter jets and a C-130. The fighters did some flips and turns for a few minutes and about 20 minutes later the C-130 flew over and dropped a flag thing out. It went around (the long way) 2 more times and each time dropped out a string of paratroopers. Then the fighters went across a couple of more times and that was it. All that took about 90 minutes. The crowd seemed to enjoy it.

Betsy is spending her birthday traveling. She went to the NWest with our 2 guards and the Art teacher from school on Thursday. They should be home tomorrow afternoon. I am planning to find her gift today at one of the big markets but with all the random road closures I might have to wait until tomorrow. If I can get to the market it should be fairly empty.

I discovered the hard way yesterday that one can not expect anything built here to be made with any kind of standardization. I have been working with some students over the past few weeks putting on screen windows at a center for handicapped children. No two windows were the same and none were square. It was a challenge but we managed to get it all done. This week I decided to tackle making screen doors. The Madame in charge asked that I build 2 double doors for the dorm rooms. Single doors would have been a whole lot easier but we are here to serve. I built the doors in the CAM shop over the week and had them ready to go. I checked out a 15 passenger van so I could slide the doors right in on the seats. What I did not account for were 11 students signing up to go with me. It's only a 15 drive but they were crunched. I always try to put Cameroonians in the front seat next to me so the police are less likely to stop me. 3 white people in the front and you might as well have your papers in your hand before you leave the school. Anyway, most of the girls went off to play with the kids and me and the boys and 3 Cameroonian girls worked on hanging these doors. The doorway is 10 inches thick of poured concrete so we anchored the frame and shimmed it up to straighten it out. One door was about an inch higher on one side than the other and the floor was higher in the middle. After 3 hours of tinkering and adjusting, we finally got them to swing good. The Cameroonian girls chose to stay with us I suppose because visiting with a bunch of African kids is just not that big a deal to them. None of them had ever really done any building projects before. We let them each try a turn on the drill and hammer in a couple shims. It was very entertaining. My project for next week is to install some gutters that will empty into a barrel so they can collect rainwater. Right now they just put buckets under the roof edge and catch the drips. This way they could open the valve and get water anytime and not just when it rains. I have a plan drawn up but I have to run it by Madame Monique. I can't imagine she would say no but just in case.

I finished making my World Geography final last night. 194 questions. They will have to name every independent nation in the world. I have a series of outline maps with all the nations numbered. They have to write down the correct names. No list to choose from. I put all the stuff on the class directory so they have had a month and a half to get ready. They know exactly what to study so they shouldn't complain. I have offered a substantial reward to anybody who gets them all right. I figured that nobody would really try for it so I hadn't really thought about what the reward would be but now it seems that a few have taken my challenge head on. I better come up with something or there's going to be a revolt.

The big banquet (prom) is this Friday. I wasn't too happy with the idea of letting school out 2 hours early so kids could go home and get ready. It doesn't start until 6pm but school is letting out at 1pm. Also the 11^th graders are taking pretty much the whole day off to go to the University conference room and decorate. It seems like a lot of shuffling around on banquet day. Teachers have to arrange for shorter classes and to accommodate 11^th graders with homework etc. It was a hot topic at a staff meeting a few weeks ago. The question that seemed to end the discussion was "Why didn't they plan it for Saturday?" I hope I didn't upset anybody.

It has been raining off and on all morning. A small leak has developed in our roof somewhere. Every strong rain leaves a little puddle in our dining room by the back door. The road from downtown is still open so that means I can get to school. I don't know if I will be able to get back but I can get there. I have some schoolwork to catch up on anyway. Dan Grove is in town so that means street hockey at 2:30.

 

That's about it from here. Our plane gets into MPLS on 09Jun and we look forward to seeing you all. Our goal this summer is to speak at some churches and to raise enough money to come back next year. It will be tough and we need to raise a lot but we have faith that He will take us where we need to be.

 

Take Care and God Bless

 

Brian & Betsy