All hands on deck !

This is one of those times when we are very glad to have an abundance of young people. Emptying a container in two and a half hours is hard work. "Ampil min, chay pa lou" is a Haitian saying which means many hands make for light work. We saw great tools, clothing for all categories of people, school desks, lamps, examination tables, chairs, toys, bicycles and lots of lumber. Our thanks to the wonderful folks of New Jersey, especially the Ridgewood AM Rotary Club, who found all this stuff, stored it and sent it to us. You are our special friends. God bless you.

Transfer

Most of the wood was transferred immediately to the carpenters' workshop to avoid having to move it later. The old military truck comes in real handy at times like this. That's Michelet in the foreground.

Too wet to work

Had torrential rains all night last night. That puts a halt to the earthbag house, at least for this morning. Here are Denis, Aye and Junior thinking about what to do next. Notice the metal tamper next to Denis. This works much better, is more solid and a better workout for the biceps.

Barbed wire

Photo taken yesterday afternoon. Here we see (from left) Janel, Junior, Denis and Winzor. The barbed wire is much easier to handle now that we have learned how.

Make it a dozen

Mama pig gave birth very early yesterday morning and they just kept coming out. We now have a dozen little piglets running into each other. The kids are fascinated by the piglets and keep wanting to hold them which Mama doesn't quite seem to appreciate.

Decision time

These are the three choices for the new elementary school uniforms. Sorry the colors don't come out well. My preference is the one in the middle which is a tan and green plaid for the shirt or blouse and a matching moss green for the trousers or skirt. Wouldn't you know it that this combination is the most expensive--- like ten dollars more per uniform!
Had to go with a new uniform as the old one would not take the abuse the kids put it through. This new material is much stronger. We'll have to go with recuperated old uniforms and some new ones for a while but that's reality.
Will let you know tomorrow which of the three made the cut.

Earth bag house

This is a shot of the day's work on the earthbag house. Lots of lessons learned.

One big lesson: it is much smarter to sew the bags shut after putting in the sand and clay mix. A sewn bag can take 11 shovels' worth of mix unlike an unsewn bag of only 5 shovels' worth. That's Pierre-Rinot taking his turn as an earthbag tailor.

We broke two wooden tampers so we're making a couple of iron ones for tomorrow. The barbed wire was tricky but we finally got the hang of it. Several of us are walking around with band-aids tonight.