Congolese Construction - Brick Walls

There are three kinds of bricks here in Goma. There are the lava rock
bricks that people make using hammers - 12 bricks a day yields a worker
50 dollars a month here at Maji. Then there are the concrete bricks
which are never made using enough cement and so some of them can just be
rubbed away with your fingers, and others you actually have to try a bit
harder or use a finger nail. Not exactly what I'd want to build a
prison out of for sure. Then there are the red clay bricks that are all
shipped in to Goma (because we don't have any clay - just lava). It is
these bricks that we will discuss today.

The new house at Maji is being built with a combination of bricks, but
the red bricks make up a lot of it. When they build the walls the
bricks are too far apart with lots of mortar in between the bricks.
Also because the bricks are not made very well, handled poorly, and just
poor quality in general, the edges are always chipped, usually more
round than an edge, and there are often dents and cracks on the brick
face as well. It doesn't look too bad from a distance, but it's not
what most people would choose to have their living room walls made
with. Joe is no different; even though the walls in the living room and
bedroom both are made of these bricks, it's not good enough.

So begins the process. First the workers take the broken bricks and
brick pieces and collect them from all over the site. Then they smash
them with a hammer until they are small enough to fit in the mortar and
pestles they use here. You guessed it, then they grind them in the
mortar and pestle until they are a fine powder. To make sure they are
fine enough they rub the powder through a screen. They then have the
colorant for the walls. They mix this with a little bit of cement and
they fix the walls.

I'm not talking about patching up the cracks on the faces of the bricks,
or even finishing some of the edges so they are actually edges. They
redo the whole wall. They bring the whole wall our a half inch or so as
they make a new brick over each previous brick. Using trowels they make
the face flat and smooth and then using trowels again they make the
edges sharp. They do each brick. It's painstaking work and I asked the
guy how much he did in a day and he highlighted an area of wall about
two and a half feet square. That's all that guy is going to be doing
for weeks!

There is one section of wall that is more gray than others and it was
the first section, so I think they added too much cement to the mix to
cover up the red from the bricks. Also I don't know what they are going
to do for mortar because now there is a good inch and a half depth from
the brick face to the existing mortar and it doesn't look very good.
I'm sure they will do something with that later. I also noticed on the
second wall they started on, they ignored the under layer of bricks
completely and are just spacing the new bricks where there is a good gap
and making the rows completely straight, which makes it look a lot
better, but then why did they use the red bricks on the wall in the
first place? Kind of crazy, but I must admit the end product does look
pretty nice.

Josh's Future

If you're going to read any post on my blog this year, this is the one
to read. Why is that? Well, here all things will be revealed and
understanding will flood your mind, the heavens will part, the angels
will sing, and Josh will hopefully get accepted to grad school in the Fall.

That's right. There have been rumors going around for a while, so I
figured I might as well get a jump on it and quell them now. Different
people know different amounts of what follows and I'll try and do my
best to relay all important information.

About four weeks ago now I decided to apply for grad school. I told
some people I was applying for January or next Fall - people that might
talk to Megan because I didn't tell her right away. Maybe I should have
told her sooner, but since I wasn't sure if I would be able to apply, if
I would get accepted, or even if it would work out for me to go in the
Fall, I didn't want to get her hopes up. Well, since I told her about a
week ago, and I'm sending in my application today, I figured I'd let
everyone know so they can pray for me.

I'm applying for a M.S. in Plant Breeding and Plant Genetics. I am
studying with the full intent of possibly working abroad when I'm done.
I've seen a huge need in this area here and I feel it's a great way to
use the academic ability God has given me and the technical mind to
really help people in a way not many people are doing right now. Many
people could do what I am doing now, but breeding requires more
training. I've taken a course on it too and loved it. I like that
plant breeding can work with so many things - increased yield, increased
nutrient content, disease resistance, local adaptability, etc... It's
also no limited to food crops and I think agriculture and plant breeding
as a part of that push, could really help some countries in Africa.
Right now I'm thinking about the Congo and using that in my mind as the
example because it's what I know most, but I hear other places are in
similar situations.

A degree in plant breeding will also give me a good background for
further study, or give me the background to get a good job in the states
as well. Basically, I see it as a great option. It's also the only
thing I've considered studying seriously for more than a week. I've
thought about it before, and think it's great. All the people I've
talked to agree as well, so that's encouraging.

The application deadline for Plant Breeding is July 31, but somewhere I
saw that most appointments were made by April 15 with the people
applying by January having the best shots. I missed the January bit for
sure, but am hoping my application is good enough to get in by the April
15 deadline. I hope to know by then if I'm in, but I don't know when
I'll know. Maybe I'll get an e-mail when I send in my application
today. I also saw somewhere that about 10 percent of the applicants get
accepted usually, so it's definitely not a given.

If I get accepted I'll be in Madison for two to three years working on
that. I'll come back from Congo in August and have at least one weekend
to go camping and fishing before starting at Madison again. I'm excited
because Megan will finish in December, so we'll have another semester
together in Madison, and I'm excited to get involved with the Navigators
Christian fellowship again as well.

So that's my future as I see it laid before me right now. My family and
Megan are both all about it so I'm really hoping it works out. If it
doesn't work out, I'm not sure what I'll do yet, but will probably stick
around here a bit and come back in time for deer hunting. That's right,
I have priorities in life. Okay, maybe I wouldn't come back for deer
hunting, but I'd consider it. Hopefully I won't have to think about it.

So, here's my request: please pray for my acceptance to Madison this
fall and that I find out soon. After I send in my application the
people writing my letters of recommendation will be notified and given
instructions as to what to do, so you can pray for good letters as well
and that they will be sent in quickly. Thanks for the prayers, and I'll
keep you posted on any progress.

Congolese Construction - Finishing walls

Using clay bricks to construct walls is a great idea, but when care is
not made in keeping the bricks edges straight and unbroken, and not a
lot of care is used when putting up the bricks, a rather horrible
looking wall is the result with too much concrete mortar between the
joints and too far to the middle of the brick to look good. The thing
is, for construction here, it never ends at that stage. It's always
covered up with a layer of cement and sand to make a smooth finish. I
had the pleasure of watching this process in Beni and I'll describe the
situation.

A rather short guy was the one finishing the wall. He was working on
the top part of the wall and was standing on two boards placed across
the top of a 55 gallon drum creating his OSHA approved scaffold. The
cement mixture was brought to him periodically as the cardboard he was
using to keep it on couldn't hold much and he was going through it
pretty quickly. The cardboard was sitting on the floor boards of the
scaffold and the corners were propped up using chunks of broken bricks.
This basin is where he would scoop the mix from using a trowel. With
some unnecessary hand movements (okay, maybe they were necessary, but
they looked a bit weird) the trowel would reach the spot he was working
on (about head high at this point) and he would throw the mix into the
joint on the wall. After slapping more mix on the wall with the trowel,
he used a wooden float to smooth it out. This was a piece of wood about
8 inches square and it had a simple handle on the back (two small strips
of wood running parallel to each other with one more strip of wood
bridging the gap making a handle) and he would go over the wall in a
circular motion (these are also the kinds of floats they use to smooth
out the floors).

If it is an important wall, strings will be set across the wall in a big
"X" to show how far out the mix should come. If it's not an important
wall (this one wasn't), the eye is fine. It will be uneven, but then
again, the rest of the house is probably uneven too so it doesn't really
matter much does it?

Beni

So I realize this is a week late, but I've been really lazy this last
week, so that's my excuse, and I'm sticking to it.

On the tail end of my travels, I ended up in Beni, Congo. Beni is about
an hour plane flight north of Goma and in my opinion, way better than
Goma. Maybe I'm a little biased because Goma is lava and difficult to
grow things in, but Beni was awesome. No lava. No fighting. Not as
much traffic. Life was slower and simpler (so that's pretty darn simple
compared to the states). I actually pictured the Shire from Lord of the
Rings more than once, and was very impressed with the University I was
working at there (a couple posts ago I talked a bit about UCBC).

I was working with agriculture on their 90 acres of land, mapping out
possibilities and working with them to come up with a plan for
agriculture at UCBC. It was a blast and they were excited about
everything we talked about and willing and interested in doing all sorts
of stuff. Things were going great the first of my two weeks there and I
really felt progress was being made and was excited to start putting
into practice some of the stuff I was talking about.

Then a building team came from Elmbrook Church in Milwaukee, Wisconsin,
and messed everything up. Okay, it was cool to talk with fellow
Wisconsinites again, and they were great people to talk to and I'm glad
they came, and they do pretty cool stuff for the university, but they
screwed with my work. As soon as they came, all of the workers and
logistical people came and helped them out and I'm not the kind of
person that insists upon doing what I want to do. I helped out a bit,
talked with students, did stuff on the computer, etc... Needless to
say, my two weeks felt a bit feeble compared to the recommendations I
had made in the first week and the lack of any showing the next week. I
tried to write things out as clearly as possible, but I don't know if
anything will happen from it. I plan on going back though (because I
loved Beni) and will see if anything has happened. I hope something
happens agriculturally, but only time will tell.

Brett

It's a sad day for all of Wisconsin (and apparently the world). Yesterday Justin got a phone call from his best friend, breaking the news of the Packer's quarterback's retiring. There is a team from Elmbrook church at the Kasali's house right now working with UCBC, and a cloud fell over many of them. It was actually depressing that here in Africa, news like that, about sports, can cause depression. Isn't it enough to depress the majority of the US at a time? (Only one team's fans can ever be truly happy. Those people that talk about "building years" and "it was a good season" are only trying to appease their souls).

I also thought it was interesting a couple hours later when, on CNN's global broadcast, they mentioned Brett's retiring and talked about it for a good 2 minutes at least. In this land of football (soccer) I wonder what think when they see these crazy guys who wear helmets and huge pads and claim to play "football". Either way, Brett will be missed, and his retirement made international news. Congrats to an outstanding career.

Congolese construction - mixing concrete

In America, working with concrete is no problem. When we want some on a
job site, we call the concrete company and say "I want 18 yards" and
they ask about kinds, additives, and figure out a delivery schedule.
When you want concrete in Congo, you mix it by hand, on the ground, with
a shovel.

It all starts with a pile of sand on a fairly "flat" surface. This pile
of sand could be a bucket, or a truck. At David's house, it's probably
a pile equivalent to 5 wheel barrows full of sand (the quality
contractor wheel barrows, not the garden ones). Then you need cement.
The cement comes in 50 kg bags and they never use enough (but that's
another blog post all together). The fairly cone like pile gets a spot
hollowed out and a bag is dumped in the hollow. They go to another spot
and fill in another hollow with cement. This continues until the pile
is sand with cement in pockets on the surface. Now, fun part number one
begins.

With shovels and lots of labor, they mix the cement and sand. They turn
the pile, flip it over, move it from side to side, and in general, act
like kids playing in the dirt until it's all a uniform color. depending
on the size of the pile, this is a lengthy operation, and is quite fun
to watch (although the workers don't always appreciate that). Once it
is a uniform color they know it's mixed well and they make it into a
circle shape about a foot or a foot and a half high.

Then they bring on the gravel. They bring this from the gravel pile
usually in small buckets (probably 2 gallons or so) and dump it, bucket
by bucket, onto the mix. They just dump it on top until they feel it's
enough gravel (the gravel is usually bigger than anything I've ever seen
in the states as well). Once all the gravel is on the pile, that begins
fun part number two.

I see what you're thinking, but you're wrong. They do not mix this like
they did the sand and cement. They get a hose of water (or lots of
jerry cans) and pour some water onto one small part of the mix. They
then mix the cement/sand/rock mixture only until that water is used and
then they use that part of the concrete. They then move next to that
section, adding more water and using shovels to mix the whole shebang.

They are complete with the concrete pouring when all the concrete is
used. It's not like the states where the truck empties the extra
concrete somewhere and cleans out. There is always something that can
use concrete. Something else standing by that is just waiting for
concrete. Something with it's hand in the air saying "pick me, pick
me." Any "left over" concrete goes here, and if it's not enough for the
extra job, oh well, it'll be finished another day. Hermoine Granger
would be proud of the walkway by the lake at Maji Matulivu which has
shot it's hand into the air more times than she has in all her classes
at Hogwarts.

UCBC

It's been a while, and for that, I partially apologize. I've been in
Beni, Congo and where I'm at, we don't have internet every day like I do
in Goma. It's really exciting being here though and very happy to be a
part of UCBC and what is going on here.

Beni is a city with about a quarter of a million people (rough, rough
estimate not done by me) north of Goma (on the other side of the
equator) and I love it. There are some, very short paved roads in town
and the rest are all dirt and rock roads. Better than the dirt roads in
Goma, but not by much. The improved speed of travel (because the road
is better) makes each pothole you hit (okay, the road is really just a
series of potholes that vary only in size and depth) more significant.
Along with the roads though, I love Beni and I love UCBC.

The Universite Chretienne Bilingue du Congo is a new university started
by David Kasali and his wife and will focus on creating strong leaders
with moral values and a purpose in life. The staff is Christian and
they teach Christian values. They are not exclusive and will accept
anyone who wants to come, but everyone will know that they are
Christians. They take classes not only in English, French, math,
science, etc... but also classes like Congo Realities where they learn
about the Congo and what some of the problems are. David said his
purpose with that class was to get the students angry and upset over
what is happening in the Congo and then to talk about ways to change the
system and fix what is happening. They are just taking exams for their
first term now and this term focused on English, to get the students a
foundation in the English language (almost all of them already know
French) and some basic courses (science and the Congo Realities). Their
dream is to have a university that can have people come from the states
and Europe to teach classes at the university level and their students
will not only understand, but be changed by their time at the university
and stay in Congo and help change the Congo.

They have humble beginnings right now. The Congo Initiative
(www.congoinitiative.org) is the fund raising and logistical
organization in the states, and through them this university is being
built. But it would be very wrong to say that's the whole picture.

Right now there is a "Depot" (a shop or mechanic's place) and one
building on the land. That one building has offices (with no lights or
internet), classrooms (2 finished rooms with tables and chairs enough
for each student only so they carry their chair with them if they have
to switch rooms), a library (with no shelves, books, tables, or chairs
yet), a computer lab (with no computers, tables, or chairs) and
unfinished bathrooms and one other room (unfinished means a dirt floor
yet). They have computers and books coming in a container from the
states. It hasn't left Phoenix yet (yes dad, that is the one we packed
in Wisconsin back in September - they had more stuff that was made
available so they were waiting for that stuff to get there before
sending it off) but when that gets here, there are lots of books and
quite a few computers (I know because I packed them) in there and it
will be the best library in Beni. The idea isn't just to be the best in
Beni, but to be the best possible, to have high standards in a country
where educational standards are dropping and paying people or offering
your body to teachers means good grades.

They have 80-90 students and most of them walk to school. They walk one
to two hours to get to school, and then walk back. Some of the students
approached David and asked if they could stay in some rooms in the
Depot, so there are a couple students staying there instead of walking
every day. They are hoping and praying for a 29 seater bus that would
make two trips to pick everyone up, but it's about 25000 dollars for a
decent one and gas is expensive. The only form of transport available
right now is motos and there is no public taxi or bus system.

A lot of the money for the buildings and things at the university come
from the states, but not all of it. At one time they were stalled in
building because of no money and it was close to being completed. As
the local people realize that the university is really for them and that
incredible things will happen there, they started making small donations
of money and supplies. Stores would donate a bag of cement and people
would volunteer to work. It's a very cool story and I hope someone
documents it for the future students of the university to read and
understand what the school is about.

One last thing. As the university is being built and a bus is being
looked for, the current students decided that next year (or when they
have a bus) the new students will have to walk to school for one month
before being allowed to take advantage of the bus. This "character
building" experience is seen as an integral part of the overall
education by the students who want to share this with their "descendants."