Up at 8, bus back to village. Our team is going back to the 1st house we did the roof for, to help with the tiling of their new kitchen/WC. When we get there, the tiler is already advancing well. We take a look at the roof - since yesterday they have put down the polythene and a layer of concrete, and moved into one of the rooms underneath.... Bill starts helping the tiler with grouting, the rest of us are on sand duty : moving a large pile of sand from the ground floor where it was delivered (in the living room!) up to the corridor upstairs (to be used for the tiling). Eventually, we have pretty much the entire family in the bucket chain... My attempts to learn arabic words are not a great success - much laughter.... Can't manage to carry the sand buckets on my head either like the women of the family. Not enough hair perhaps?
Then, we have to sieve all the sand. It comes pretty much as-is from the Western Desert, stones and all. To use for the cement we have to sieve it. Easy enough at the start, after 10 minutes the muscles are aching.... We press gang the young lads into helping!
Have a go at grouting the wall, using powdered grout (not ready mixed like at home). The moisture from the fresh cement is absorbed to make it into a paste. The tiles are applied to the wall on a cement base, which is pretty thick as the wall is very rough an unevent brickwork. Hard to get the tile wall to end up straight/flat! I have a go with a couple of tiles - not too bad, but about 1/10th of the speed of the pro! Back to grouting.....
Over snack lunch we learn the other groups have been plastering, and digging foundations.... Hotter work than us!
We're leaving to a different village tonight, so we get a tour of the local church (prespyterian evangelical - looks a lot like a church in Scotland!) We get a talk from the pasteur; a strong hint of request for funding for their new building which is to house their nursery and church halls.... Hope he's not too disappointed in the felt pens and other stuff we give to the sunday school! We decide to do this rather than give directly to individual kids, which is likely to cause problems!!
In the bus we head along the road to Beni Suivf, a university town about 1 hour away. More exciting driving.... The hotel is the university conference center - pretty basic but ok. Some disappointment when we find out they don't serve beer..... Nice cake for a snack though. Time for a walk along the Nile edge - there's a nice park / walkway being installed for several km along the river edge. Some people are swimming, and other families are coming down to eat at sunset. We get several invitations to join them to eat! However, we head back to the hotel for our own dinner. No police seem to feel a need to follow us here - much more relaxed....
posted by brian.wyld @ 1:55 AM
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