Maji ni Uhai

On Thursday I headed to the site with Mama Mcharro, a hydrologist. She was successful with our first well, which provides us four times more water than we’ll need with a campus full of students. But you can never be too careful here regarding water. In one of the major traffic circles in Moshi is a statue that has the following words on its plinth: maji ni uhai, water is life. (Incidentally, one of the Kiswahili words for “traffic circle” is kipulefti, taken from the signs in English often posted at such places.) We recognize how precious this resource is and are trying to be good stewards and good examples for others. We’ll reclaim water for use in irrigation and will “harvest” it during the rainy season from the many square feet of roofs on the campus.

Mama Mcharro is very excited about the project and is happy to help us, but not without some trepidation. On each visit to survey and make her calculations about drilling, she’s encountered snakes: puff adders and cobras. Saint Patrick managed to get them off of Ireland, who will rid us of these creatures here?

While at the site I stopped by to check on the progress of the biodigester. Pretty amazing to see what’s happening on that front. I cannot underscore enough what an important role our using this as our means of treating wastewater will play. Already we have had two other institutions – one of them the University of Dodoma – visit us to enquire about the process. It is good to serve as a model for smart design – not cheap, mind you, but good!

Our carport is presently being used as a manufacturing site. The aluminium windows are being assembled there. It is pretty amazing to see the efficiency of the process, from cutting the aluminium and assembling the sections to inserting the glass and screens. At the same spot our desks are being manufactured.

In the office we’ve been busy with our admission applications. They were due last Wednesday. We’re still waiting on quite a number of them in anticipation of our testing day, 2 October. We’re putting our candidates’ information on a spreadsheet; once we have the data from the entrance tests we can enter that and begin to make admissions decisions.

Finally, I’m spending today finishing an article for a Spanish journal published by Radio Ecca. I’ve thought about it a lot, have written a number of notes, but now is crunch time, and I must actually write the article. (This reminds me of my mother. Several years ago I asked her how she was enjoying reading The Agony and the Ecstasy. “Well the agony is picking the book up, and the ecstasy is putting the darn thing back down.” The ecstasy was being asked to contribute to the journal; the agony is actually doing the work.)

omnia optima.