a little construction update...

One of my jobs here is to go out to the property a couple of times a week and take pictures of the progress being made on the construction. Well, being that I have won the "Most Pictures Taken in a Single Day" award from the Tourist Association of North America, (that includes Canada and Mexico) this is a job that I can totally do......maybe.

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The top 2 pictures are of the rebar (is that how rebar is spelled?) operation. Now before I go any further into my very accurate and technical explanation of these pictures I should warn you that my interpretation of these photos may differ slightly from someone else's explanation like, for example, an engineer's explanation....but I will do my best.

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Okay, back to the rebar operation. Rebar is very heavy (is everybody with me so far?). It is used to reinforce things. You know, like boundary walls around hospital compounds in Togo. It comes in long sticks when you buy it from the man in town down the road from the CAP station. 200 sticks of rebar don't fit on the back of the water truck very well. As a matter of fact, half of them fall off the back of the water truck when you are trying to drive back to the property and you have to get out of the truck and try to slide them back on one by one and 3 school boys see you acting like a nut and come over and help you get the rebar sticks back onto the water truck. But that's beside the point.

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Anyway, the workers tie this rebar together somehow and make "mats" - I'm sure that what I heard Kevin call them....rebar mats. Then they carry them on their heads way out to the other side of the property and put them down on the ground beside the long hole that some other workers dug. At some point I'm sure this rebar goes into that hole but I haven't been there to see that happen so I can't explain the process yet. I'm sure you're on the edge of your seat waiting for the next chapter of my new book, "Rebar for Dummies."

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Okay, the middle 2 pictures are of the block making/watering operation. Workers make each block by hand. They mix the cement with sand and some other things I'm sure and then put the mixture into a mold, bang on it with a shovel and then another worker turns the mold upside down and dumps it out. It's a lot like making a sand castle at the beach using one of those sand castle molds that your parents would buy you at the souvenir shop by the beach and then complain about the price and say they could have gotten it cheaper in Lakeland at Walmart. Or maybe that's just my own experience, I don't know.

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Well, once the blocks are all dumped out and lined up they have to "cure." Don't quote me on that one but I'm pretty sure that "cure" is the word I've heard used in relation to this process. Then the next day, which happens to be Saturday, you want to do something fun so you go back out to the property with your husband and "water" the blocks. You don't water them so that they will grow into bigger blocks, you water them to make them stronger. Don't ask me how that works because that's right where I stopped asking questions.

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The last 2 pictures are of Kevin driving the aforementioned (yes, that is one word) water truck and Kevin with 2 workers looking at the long hole where the rebar goes.

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I trust that you now have an accurate picture of what is taking place here. Feel free to share what you have learned with your friends and co-workers. No charge.