Keeping a night watch with my commandos - workers who lay concrete base for the main water retention tank at the side of the shrine. Note that we do not have such a luxurious equipment as concrete mixer. Everything is done manually. So, to boost their morale and keep fatigue away, we made some coffee for us so we don't fall on our noses into the pit, and after initial several hours of concrete mixing and pouring by means of water buckets filled with concrete in half and passed from one to another all the way down to the pit where 'mafundi' (masons, experts) were - and a dinner break, we set off with second mix of concrete. Hopefully, if we do not run out of water, which is quite possible as the water level in my home tank is dangerously low, we may finish the job by today's (yes, it is today already) afternoon...
Just few shots I took an hour ago to show you how hard and tough this work is here with little or none mechanical help; and how determined and dedicated are my workers. Hats off to them! May good Lord bless them and keep them safe!
Everything since 1991 has been done in the same manner - hard earned money donated by kind benefactors, hard manual work, one step at the time, in sweat and tears, numerous obstacles, problems, hard earned satisfaction at the end. Thank God for giving us heroic patience to never give up!
Alas, we ran out of water in the early morning hours, so now there is no other way but to take barrels, drums, whatever containers we have at our disposal and use my car to fetch water from a not so distant creek...our village pipeline is bone dry, pumps are broken at the lake inlet point, they are fixing them, then the pipe above Kiabakari is damaged in one place, so it will take time to fix all these problems. And we - without water and time running out. Lord, give me patience and positive attitude, please :)
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