Power is back :), Riots, and Happy Birthday Christina

Happy Birthday Christina.  This makes three years in a row that I have been in Nigeria for your birthday.

I have not had power since 7 pm Sunday night. It is now Tuesday at 4:30PM as I was about to walk to the market where I can buy some cold water the power came on. Sunday night the wire that feeds electricity to my house came loose from the cut-out (fuse) over at the pump house. Power was on Sunday night due to the riots and stayed on until after midnight. Then there was power again Monday morning for a few early hours. If the wire had not come loose I would have had two bottles of ice in my frig and about 6 bottles of cold water on Monday and cold water today. By Monday afternoon there was no ice and the water was cooler than the house. The pump house operator fixed my line Monday morning when I told him I had no power. He grabbed the line feeding my house to show me that I should have power and discovered it was not connected. Monday evening the Church generator  was on long enough for me to boil one pot of water to fill my Thermos. Today I put a bottle in a pan of water and set it in the breeze coming out of the bath and bedroom area to bring the temperature down a little. Now it is under the ceiling fan. Evaporative cooling. Monday night the Governor ordered a curfew to prevent further riots. Church activities were cancelled. So, the generator stopped early. At about 12:45 this morning as I was tossing in my bed when I saw a flash and heard a loud bang. The power had come on but the lines along the street had shorted out. The people on the other side of the street had lights on. We were dark.

Riots?  I just mentioned riots twice and continued to talk about my comfort conditions of wanting a few hours of ceiling fan, refrigerator, computer power, and being able to boil water to drink my tea. The riots here will not make the news compared to the riots further north. Nobody killed, no churches burned, no houses burned. Lots of tires burned at various intersections. Two journalists had reported that Adamawa State had voted for General Mohammad Bahir a former military ruler. When the actual results were announced the General had only take 7 of the over 30 local government areas. His supports went from celebration to protest. Youth from the church came here and took up stations around the church and the compound to help protect the area. The police and army responded and a few shots were fired in the air. The protestors here are not armed. Up north the protestors were armed and killed two policemen including an Inspector. The only count I have heard is that Kano capital had two people killed. I heard it was worst in Kaduna and mostly southern Kaduna which has a high Christian population. The BBC “Africa Have Your Say” program had a lot of people call in to express their opinion. The largest opinion is that the poor education, lack of jobs have created a large amount of poorly educated unemployable youth that can be bought to cause trouble for a few dollars. The leaders in these northern states liked to have a group of thugs like these youth to do their bidding. Some expressed the opinion that there was a culture of IMPUNITY. That they can do whatever they want and the rules only applies to the others. This may partially, come from years of military rulers, years of rigged elections, and years of people doing what they want. The rulers in the northern states are going to have to reduce the money they put in their own pockets and start educating their youth and improving their economy.

Here in Yola the government built a new market. With a 4 lane divided street in front of it. Vendors set up in the street and blocked all but a narrow lane. This was an easy choke point for the protesters to stop traffic on one of the busiest streets in town. On Monday the police made them close down and get off the streets. We heard there was trouble there as we had just turned to drive that way. We made a U-turn and took another route back. That is when the Governor (A retired Admiral) called for the curfew. Tonight it does not start until 8 PM.

Tomorrow will be a long hot day. We are driving to Dingai, the other sight that the CBPHC will have their pilot project. The P in that is Primary not Public. I spent much of my Army career in Public Health I naturally say Public. Community Based Primary Health Care is the correct name. Dingai is about a four hour drive from here. We will go there have meetings with the people and then get back here. Friday and Monday have been declared national holidays for Easter. Tuesday is the last of the three elections. This is for the Governors of most states and for the state legislators. These are real important elections.

Until I was here for a while I did not understand why they had three separate elections. At home we have one big one. But here to make the elections fair and transparent, the people who want to vote arrive in the morning and get accredited. Then they return at noon and all have to stay at the polling station until the voting is over.  Then the votes are counted in front of the voters. The voters go home knowing who won in their ward. Eventually, the wards will be combined at the Local Government Authority level (like our county) and then at the State level and finally at the National level for the President. The first election was for the Federal Senate and House. It was test for how it would work for the second week for the President. The first election was delayed a week. The pushed third election into Easter Weekend and then on to Tuesday after Easter.

These elections are important to the people because it directly affects them. If they elect a representative to the State Legislature and that candidate’s party becomes the ruling party they will get more money spent in their ward. If they elect a minority candidate they may not get much. This being the first “free and fair” election that was run by a college professor rather than former military officers the minority parties have a chance. Since, the number of people voting in each ward is known and counted in front of the voters the ballot boxes cannot be pre-stuffed with the ruling party votes.

With every election things get fairer. Four years ago the courts threw out several Governor elections due to massive fraud. That was a first. The courts went against the ruling party. Now they have a cumbersome lengthy but mostly transparent election system. Still a few ballot boxes went missing. But not the massive fraud of the past. With fair elections the elected officials have to be concerned about the electorate to get re-elected. They may not have as much government money going into their own pocket but more to the people. We pray that this is the result.

I just heard an announcement that one of the candidates in Tuesday elections wants everyone to know she has not dropped out of the race. She blames her opponents of starting the rumor.

Got to stop now and make some chicken Ramon like stuff while I have power. Maybe I will have cold powdered milk in the morning the frig has been on for an hour and a half. The water in freezer is down to  70 degrees.

Communuty Based Primary Health Care Program, Wakka Leaders Meeting April 14

The plan was to leave by 6:00 AM. We did pretty good. We got off by 6:30. Yakubu was driving the Hi Lux. Dr. Chidama Barka (local Consultant to the CBPHC Program) got the front seat, Albetha Yakubu (Community Health Extension Worker who is going to be assigned to Wakka as one of the Mobile Leadership Team) and I were in the back seat. We drove from Jimeta/Yola to Numan where we picked up Manzo Gaji (Community Development Officer to be assigned to Wakka as the other member of the Mobile Leadership Team), some cold bottle water, some fried bananas and some bean cakes (Yakubu did not have any breakfast). He squeezed into the backseat with Albetha and me. From Numan we headed west on the Numan to Jalingo Highway to near the border of Adamawa and Taraba States.  Driving this highway you have to choose which pot holes to hit and which shoulder to drive on. 

 

Just before Mayo Lope we turned onto the dirt road leading to Wakka and waited for the  Bishop Denhem Abba (Todi Diocese) and Fidilus (the Secretary of the Medical Board and a Community Health Extension Officer for the LCCN). From here we headed into the bush on a dirt road (one lane but wide enough for two vehicles to pass in most places). Crossing 4 dry river or stream beds and bouncing up a trail between two large hill, we arrived in Wakka new District Church a little before 10 AM.

This was not a “Water and Sanitation Hygiene” visit, I tried to blend into the background so the Community Based Primary Health Care Program would get all the attention. Of course being the only white person in town running around like a Japanese tourist taking pictures, I did not blend well. The purpose of this visit was to meet with the leadership of the area and introduce the CBPHC team. The concept of community based development is to have a bottom up program where the community is responsible for developing their own community. The CBPHC team is there to help them. This is a slow process. The team spends a lot time meeting people, gaining their trust and learning about the area and the people. During this time they are making notes about resources, talents, leadership, and needs. After a time they will start having meetings with different groups to see what the people think their needs are. They will not just meet with the leaders but will seat with the youth, with the women, with families, with clans, with business people. Most villages have formal and informal leaders. The school headmaster is a formal leader. But the women may consider a woman teacher as a more important leader for them. There may be a village member who is a businessperson in Yola or Lagos and is the person that provides much of the financial support to the village. It is these relationships and more that the Mobile Leadership Team (MLT) will be seeking out during the first month they are in the village.

The meeting was mostly in Hausa and also in the local tribal language so I clapped and laughed on queue. The meeting was held under the shade of a group of Neem Trees in front of the primary school. The temperature was in the upper 90’s with a nice breeze. The local leaders included the Lutheran Pastor, Lutheran Evangelist, Baptist Pastor, 4 Imams, the local chief (pictured standing in green), the women’s leader, the youth leader and various other people. The Women Group from the church sang a song. After many introductions and song the concepts of the CBPHC were explained and that this visit was to meet with the leadership to get their input and answer the best we could their questions.  The next meeting will be for the whole village to meet the MLT. We closed with a prayer from the pastor and from the senior Imam. Followed by more singing from the women.

After the meeting I went over to the primary school take a picture of the sign saying it was a polling place and I found this black board on large tree.  

A new larger LCCN church was being built at Wakka. When we arrived the walls were up and the steep rafters had been built. A truck load of metal roofing arrived just after us. When the meeting ended half on one side of the roof was on. By the end of the day the roof will be complete. The church sung at the meeting were standing in the shade signing praises to the new roof.

We had lunch at the District Pastor’s compound and then left by the trail to the north and east to Mayo Belwa. This was a one-time experience. Everyone in the truck agreed that as bad as the road was leading to Wakka from the Numan-Jalingo Highway. The trail to Mayo Belwa was much worse. Coming to Wakka we crossed 4 streams or small river beds (this is the end of the dry season). I quit counting the streams beds and rivers we crossed at 8 on our way out to Mayo Belwa (most with steep drops).  The route may have been a little shorter but is was much longer in time and bruises as we bounced through the deep sided stream beds.

 

The only interesting thing on our way out were three balanced rocks. I asked “Who put those rocks up there”? Everyone laughed with me and said God put them there.Then we stopped to take pictures.

For the Google Earth users. 

Numan Market area where we stopped N09.45654, E012.03530,

Wakka turnoff from Numan-Jalingo Highway. N09.24920, E011.68746

Wakka Church N09.15868, E011.81334, 

Wakka Primary School N09.15738, E011.81328, 

Three rocks N09.15063, E011.82450

Mayo Belwa where we entered from the bush N09.05858, E012.05044

Does anyone use the coordinates that I give? If you do please hit comment and tell me. Otherwise I might stop adding them.

Blog Stats

I thought this might be interesting. MY blog has been viewed 354 times from 10 countries. The majority is the US, followed by Nigeria, India, Denmark, Colombia, Angola, UK, Hungary, South Korea, & South Africa. The biggest source of referrals is from Facebook. Battery is running low.

Dumne Borehole, Camera Tests

Today April 11, Yakubu, Adams, and I drove to Dumne to see the progress of the water committee and to look at the two boreholes. First we stopped and talked to the LCCN Dispenser at the Dispensary. He had 5 patients this morning but now had time to work with us. The local water committee has done nothing in the way of planning for an improved sanitation in the area. I have the feeling they were told that they need to do it but not given any education on sanitation and the benefits of the Ventilated Improved Pit latrine or the need to have a latrine. The Dispensary and the Bible School do not have latrines. After we discussed sanitation we went to the borehole that has not worked for two years. It was originally, drilled by Danish missionaries.Between 30 to 40 years ago. No pump was attached for many years. A hand pump was later added. It broke and the local government fixed it . It then broke again. With only one pump of the handle I knew that a rod had broken so the handle was no longer connected to the pump. We decided to disassemble the pump to see what was wrong and to test my borehole camera.

We got some young men to come help us with the heavy work. We disassembled the head and tried to remove the tank we could not remove the tank. So we lifted the first pipe out of the bore hole with the tank attached. Then there was no rod joint found inside the pipe at the pipe joint. So there we stood holding a 3 meter pipe up in the air with the tank section of the pump still attached at the top. Where is my hardhat?  This picture shows us doing something you are not taught in pump repair school. We are cutting the rod. The rod joint was over a meter above the pipe joint. We could not hold the pipe high enough in the air to reach the rod joint. So we had to cut the first three or four until the joint was close enough to unscrew. When we pulled the second pipe we found the broken rod. It appears that the cylinder had become jammed and they pumped so hard that they broke the rod. It was not that hard, we managed to break a rod also. In total we removed 13 pipes for a total depth of 39 meters (128 feet). We found the water at only 27.5 feet from the base of the slab. An old man at the site said he was young when they drilled the hole. It filled quickly when they broke through a rock layer. The total depth of the bore hole was 200 feet. The water meter that someone donated to the LCCN did not work properly. We found the depth to water by watching the light of the borehole camera as I lowered it. When the light disappeared we pulled it out and measured the length to the water mark on the  camera housing.

The camera worked well above the water level. But the way I attached the rope caused it to scrap the sides of the iron casing and drop rust into the water. We also did a lot of scrapping while removing the pipes. when the camera went under water it was too cloudy to show much. The pictures of the pipe above the water were pretty good. Under water I could not see much. Initial conclusion. The camera may work better in dry bore holes or boreholes that have plastic casing instead of iron.

The governments last repair had used inferior pipes (they bent when we used a pipe wrench on them) and inferior rods. After sending three cameras down with three different lights, we decided to install the cylinder we brought with us and as many of the rods and pipes that we determined to be usable. This way the people in the area would have water until we returned with good pipes and rods. As we were installing the pump head I needed the young men to lift the rod and head a few inches so I could remove the rod clamp. Unfortunately, they lifted it up more than a few inches and snapped another rod. It was now after 4 PM and we did not have time to remove the nine rods we had installed. We cleaned up and left the community with the same problem they had when we arrived. Only now we know exactly what needs to be done to fix the pump. We arrived back in Jimeta/Yola at 6 PM. I was covered in rust, dirt, oil and whatever. I drank another liter of cold water showered with warm water and washed my hands about 4 times before making a sandwich for dinner. When I post this I will take another shower. (I pour a few liters of water over my head is what I call a shower.)

Video of 3 minutes of Sunday School at LCCN Deaf Centre (23 MB)

This is a three minute video of Sunday School at the LCCN Deaf Centre. I went to the Cathedral for English services after recording part of their Sunday School. Later they had church services. There were over 20 people for the service. Ruth has been holding Sunday School and church services for many years. She has finished Seminary almost 20 years ago but has not been ordained because she has to do her one year internship. Her's is the only Deaf place of worship in Adamawa State. She is married with 5 boys. The youngest is 7 years old. It would be difficult for her to spend more than a few weeks to a month at a time away from home. We will be exploring alternate ways for her to be credited for her internship. 

I think I should have made the video smaller. It is uploading at about 40 kbps which translates to 2 hours of continuous uploading. I hope power keeps up because I do not have a strong enough battery to go that long. NEPA held up for the hour and 44 minutes for the upload. Power ended about 5 minutes after the upload ended.

New Google Earth Aerial Photo of the Jimeta Compound

The new aerial photograph on the LCCN Jimeta Compound was taken Sunday December 26, 2010. Church is being held. Click on the picture to enlarge it. The Cathedral Church and primary school is on the west side (left). The LCCN Compound is on the east side. They park their cars on the LCCN Compound during church services.

I am living in the building called Jimeta House. If you want to explore on Google Earth the coordinates are N9.280456, E012.448382. The aerial view is much different than the view on the ground. The trees are tall and most have no branches for the first 10 to 15 feet. When you are on the ground the place looks more open. I can easily see the Deaf Centre from my bedroom window. These trees are called Neem Trees. They are also known as the medicine tree. Almost all parts of the tree is used for some kind of medicine. They are evergreens but with leaves not needles. As one of the few evergreens they are a major shade tree for Africa. They are currently dropping their fruit and seeds. Two women come by every day or two and collect the seeds. They will make Neem Oil from the seeds to sell in the market.

The only open gate is by the church. The LCCN Compound gate is locked except on Sunday. The people I buy water from are on the north side of the compound. They actually get their water from the borehole on the compound. The fill a push cart with12 to 14 20-liter jerry cans (528 to 618 pounds of water) push it around the east side of the compound. Up the hill to the entrance by the church and back down to the house. I try to order water on Sunday when the other gate is open and save them 1/2 of the uphill push. I pay them the going price of 77 cents for 240 liters. Which is much more than we pay in Minnesota.

First Week of April lots of little things happening.

We had power this morning from about 4 AM to 8:00 AM. I am on battery now. This week was not one of the most productive weeks I have had in Nigeria. I had a lot of time to sit and design things. Today is the postponed elections for Federal Parliament. Most of Nigeria will be going to the poles this morning. Some areas had errors on their ballot and their election have been postponed again. I am still trying to figure out their system. It appears that people come to the voting stations in the morning. They get authenticated in the morning and they come back at 12:30 to vote. Everyone that has been authenticated votes. I think you have to be at your voting station at 12:30. If you come late you cannot vote.  This way no one can go vote at two places. During voting the roads between cities are closed. On the radio I heard there were check points in the major cities where they were inspecting cars.

The rest of this blog will be picture based. You can click on the pictures for a bigger view.

One of the purposes of this trip was to test the prototype borehole video camera I had developed. My biggest surprise was that the battery pack was my weakest link. I  made it by soldering two AAA battery holders together to make a 3 volt battery pack broke while I was using the light for the camera as a light at night. The wires on the Radio Shack battery holder were thin and broke. Pastor Peter Dagwa (a retired technician from the Adamawa State Radio came over with his soldering iron and we built the above battery pack. It is quite fragile. But works. I am glad I brought the Harvey Plumber's Epoxy with me that I molded the parts back together. On Monday we are now scheduled to go to Dumne to view two poorly working bore holes and go to the Yola Diocese Bible College site  that is under construction to video the dry bore hole there. (This is the third reschedule of this trip.)

 Last week I briefly discussed the concept plan I had drawn in 2010 of a proposed office, warehouse, training, and guest house building for the WASH and other programs based out of Yola with Dr. Thompson. He wanted to see the plan but he was staying out on the other side of town and did not come here before he left.  I had not included the Community Based Public Health assuming they would be based out of Demsa. However, there was interest from Dr. Thompson and some Medical Board members to be based in Yola. I spent the better part of Tuesday and Wednesday, when I had power or battery left, making the building a little larger and the warehouse smaller to add in some offices and storage for the CBPH program and writing an explanation of the concept of the building. The concept now has offices for the Projects Office, WASH, CBPH, Rural Development and Agriculture Office, Publications Office, and an office for the HIV/AIDS Coordinator. Several of these offices are part of the LCCN organization but have not been funded and have no staff or offices. The former staff have started their own not for profit organizations to provide services that they are passionate about.

 This is an aerial view of the portion of Jimeta/Yola that I am staying in. I am staying in the house under the place marked Jimeta House. It is in the north east corner of the LCCN Compound that is to the east of the Cathedral Church. My house was featured on the last blog. The north edge of the picture is the start of the flood plains of the Benue River. You will see a complex of large buildings to the south and west of the compound. This is the Adamawa State Specialty Hospital. I buy my fruit and hard boiled eggs at the market at the gate to the hospital. Families have to bring food for the patients. So various food sellers set up market there every day.  Fruit is probably a little cheaper at the market but this is a much easier walk. Speaking of the New Ultra Modern Market, it is the complex of many small buildings about a kilometer to the west of the hospital. To the west of the market you can see the edge of the Yola Airport. The City Cyber Cafe that I have been walking to use when I have no power would be about the center of the picture on the bottom edge.

 This is my new frig. With only 4 hours of power it will keep water a little cool. The Lutheran Youth Fellowship is having a conference at the Cathedral later today. I am hoping I can get an extra 4 or five hours of power while they are running the big generator. Right now the only perishable in it is my last hard boiled egg. On Wednesday I made some tuna fish salad for a sandwich and put the left over in the frig. Thursday we had no power all day. I used up the tuna salad for lunch and dinner on Thursday. The dinner sandwich may have been a stretch how long you should keep warm tuna fish salad.

This is Mrs. Bongi inside the recently completed Deaf Girls dormitory at the Remi Foundation School for the Disabled. They received a large grant from the Federal Government (7 million Naira) to build dormitories for Deaf  Boys and for Deaf Girls. The purpose of the facility is that the children will live in a deaf environment where the ASL they are learning in school will be their everyday language. When they live at home part of the day they live with ASL as their language and part of the day in a speaking world. They have trouble mastering ASL if it is not used at home. Remi Foundation with a grant from Denmark has held classes in ASL for parents of deaf children and interpreter classes. One mother was crying at the end of the parent's class. She said her son was a teenager. She has never been able to communicate with him. When he was bad she just beat him. Now she can talk with him. Another person went to a political rally and to his surprise on the side of the stage was one of the women that had taken the interpreter class signing in ASL. This was a first in Adamawa that the deaf were included in a main stream event.

Personal note to Barb. I gave the Gallaudet University Dictionary to Ruth Ulea at the LCCN Deaf Centre. She literally hugged the book and jumped up and down. Then when I told her that all the other books I brought were for her schools she danced.

The difference between the Remi Foundation and the LCCN Deaf Centre is that the LCCN Deaf Centre takes the poor children that cannot afford the school fees or did not get a scholarship to Remi. Also the Deaf Centre works with the whole Deaf Community (adults and children) while the Remi Foundation serve children with many disabilities. The LCCN Deaf Centre has Sunday School and Church Services in ASL and bible study in ASL. I will devote a future blog to the Deaf Centre and its needs. It does not have the national and international connections that the Remi Centre has.