Part II of the Final Day - 2 June 2007

Stop two – 9:55 am
There have been many bumps, potholes, even craters along the way. There have been doubts and plain misbelieve. Yet, my friends, the tower is up! Well, almost. The 3ft by 3ft structure and the columns to the inner tower that protrude out an extra 5 feet are erected. We’re on our last stretch, the air is light and the built up stress from the project seems to have lifted on our final trip to Margaret’s.

Of course, we make our routine stop at Olary to pick up some of the volunteers. But today is different. Today we aren’t just picking up Elizabeth and Gori and whomever else, instead, there is a heartfelt purpose. I don’t remember the orphan’s name, but I remember his story and I remember what happened on this particular day. And the story needs to be told:

Jason and the boy:

No one knows the exact age of when this boy came to be an orphan, but it was somewhere around the age of 3 or 4. He’s about 9 or 10 now. The people of the village, who also have next to nothing, have taken it upon themselves to help him out. Even Margaret, who is not from this village, gives the boy some change or food on her visits.

On this particular day, Jason got off the bus with a new t-shirt for the boy. As Jason approached, the boy retreated behind one of the nearby woman. Jason tried to give him the new shirt, but the boy didn’t know how to react to this strange mzungo giving something specifically to him. So the woman took the shirt and said she would give it to the boy. Jason returned to the bus and waited. Once Jason was clearly away from the scene, the boy placed his hands at the bottom corners of his own shirt to examine it. The worn in, mud stained shirt may have been white – once upon a time. This was probably the only shirt the boy owned-it certainly looked about 100 years old and clearly had never been washed. The woman stepped forward and helped him take off the rag and replaced it with his new, bleach white shirt. Ok, it was a little big, but the boy didn’t even notice. Any anticipation he might have felt instantly melted away and was replaced with the most magnificent smile I’ve ever seen. The look of pride on his face would bring a knot to anyone’s throat that was witnessing, and it did. Jason’s face lit up as well and he carefully got back off the bus and approached the boy again. This time, he did not run away, instead he shyly walked up to Jason and put out his hand. Jason shook it firmly and smiled. Only a smile and a nod came from the boy, but that was all that was needed. His gratitude was written from ear to ear.

As this point I lifted my eyes off the two for the first time to see that everyone in the immediate area had stopped what they were doing and were smiling just as wide at the boy. In turn, everyone approached the boy to congratulate him with a high-five, a pat on the back, and genuine praise. The boy then took off around the square, tugging at his new shirt so that everyone could see. His feet never touch the ground as he glided through the village. I can not say enough to describe the beauty of this scene, and I doubt a single person reading this blog has, no matter how excited you have ever been over a gift, has ever felt the way that boy did at the moment – over a t-shirt. This boy re-defined gratitude, and I can only pray that one day I can feel that happy about something.

2 June 2007

View from the top of the tower-- amazing, eh?

Morgan and Davies putting the windmill on the tower

“Tower is up!”

Part I of the Final Day
At promptly 7am we all met for breakfast, as usual. Just toast and a bit of pineapple today—best not risk filling my system with too much this early on, this is too big of a day to gamble with my digestive tract.

We told Linos to pick us up at 7:30; which is why we planned for 8:00, so you can imagine our surprise when the bus pulled in at 7:30 on the nose.

Jason busted out the football he had brought over for the local kids, and so Alex, Jason and I tossed it around the front lawn while waiting for the others to finish getting ready. Not that I am any good at tossing a football, but it was nice feeling to just be a bunch of 20 some year old folks again rather than 20 some year old folks that are 1000’s of miles from home, in an impoverished country, building a windmill by hand merely to charge 12V batteries.

Finally, we all pack on the bus and head to Homabay for some very last minute hole drilling before we go to site for the last time. Prior to reaching the welding shop, the bus stops early to drop Khanjan, Alex and Mark off so they can do electrical/wiring stuff. Mr. Masango hops off to get his daily paper. Mr. Masango opens the door, and begins to step onto the bus but before he can even put his foot on the step, the bus lurches forward. Linos takes off, leaving Mr. Masango, in his suit and tie, wide eyed and jaw dropped to the dirt road. No one on the bus could control their laughter while Linos has absolutely no idea what he just did. (You may not be lauging and can’t figure out why this was so funny. I guess it’s more of an inside joke. You need to understand how “proper” Mr. Masango presented himself, and the fact that it was him Linos left in the dust, made the entire scene an absolute delight!) It was going to be a good day…

Tower goes up!

Alex directing Jason and Duan constructing the first section

Up...

Up...

Keep it coming...

Today is a Saturday which means no school, so the crowd is bigger than ever.

It takes two days to get the tower up. We start from the bottom (obviously) and build section by section. Once the first section was up, Jason climbed onto the horizontal bracing that would be the bottom of the second section, Duan took his spot on the first section and we carried on. The chain reaction continued until Jason was on the top (fourth) section, Duan on the next, then Alex, then Mark. I offered my assistance from the ground. I’m scared of heights, leave me alone.

Piece by piece, the steel angles came together.

About mid afternoon on the first day, young Elizabeth came up with hard boil eggs and salt for a lunch (and warm soda, of course). Eggs have never tasted so good. No one had the energy to climb down either, so we tossed the eggs up 30 ft to Jason and Duan at the top. Then Khanjan felt confident and gave the salt shaker a go. The end result: a shattered saltshaker that belonged to a family who lived off a $1 a day; whose wall clock had probably said 10:37 for years since they didn’t even have money to purchase AA batteries. Who woulda thought one could feel so much guilt over a saltshaker.

As I might have explained before, the tower was 3’ x 3’ with an 18” x 18” smaller tower protruding out (see photos). We worked until it was nearly dark again, and the clouds for the 630 showers started rolling in. None of us want to quit, as the tower finally had substance, the adrenaline of it all was stronger than ever. However, standing on a 30ft metal tower, in the middle of nowhere, on top of the highest hill didn’t sound like the smartest idea when lightning and thunder was nearing by the second.

By the time we had our dinner it was pitch black and the first drops of the evening rains were beginning to fall. A whole lot of good my raincoat did sitting back at the hotel! Needless to say, the long walk back to the bus was muddy and drenching, but it was a beautiful evening and the day felt like our first TRULY successful day, so I don’t think anyone minded the walk. If anything, we all welcomed the cool summer shower, washing away a hard day’s sweat.

There must have been at least 20 children ranging from 2 to 13 by the end of the day. Therefore, our usual handful of handful of children that followed us back to the bus and chased it down the road for almost a mile, we had over a dozen. And just like in any group, there’s always that one that just won’t give up. In this case, it was a young boy of probably 8 or 9, and was determined to stay with the bus as long as far as he could muster. And I mean, quite literally STAY with the bus.

That boy grabbed onto the rim above the tire, raised his knees to his chest and held on for the ride! Remember, this isn’t a smooth road. In fact, we’re not even on a road. This is a field, a very muddy field that we almost got stuck in on more than once that night. We’d get to a narrow stretch, too narrow for even the bus to get through without the branches and bushes scraping along the side, and the boy would jump off. Or so we thought. Low and behold, as soon as we got into a clearing he was back again—holding onto that rim! Gone again, back again! We couldn’t lose him or shake him off. My God, we are going to be known as the students who got an innocent African boy killed by a school bus… (Don’t worry, nothing ever happened, eventually the brush got the better of him and he gave up).

Tomorrow, the windmill will be complete. The inner tower will go up, followed by the generator, blades and tail. Everyone in the village will be coming and maybe even the chief. Mr. Masango will give his big “success” speech again and will re-iterate to the village how the business-side of the windmill wil work. Tomorrow is the grand finale, and I only pray everything goes according to plan.

But for now, time for some much needed Tuskerrrrrrrrrr!!!