Greetings from the group in Lassin!

Steve here. Thought you would like to know how things are progressing from my perspective. (I sure am thankful when Carol can update the blog too)

Title: Christmas, cement, tires, and termites.

Christmas break was the time to kick off the major school improvement project. With the students out of the classrooms, we began to work in 'high gear'. At the school, Gregory began putting a concrete floor in Carol's first grade room. He was using about 6 sacks of concrete a day. I began to purchase and haul the concrete from Kumbo to Lassin.

Monday before Christmas, I bought 20 sacks of concrete and carried 10 home. The taxi that had agreed to carry the other 10 sacks became too busy with the Christmas rush and the high fares that luggage brought.
So, Tuesday I returned for the remaining 10 sacks.

It is good to know your limits, and those of your little car. You can hear it coming. I bought an extra 2 sacks, and picked up 4 boxes of sugar cubes for Shey John. This brought the load to 12 x 50kg (1320#) plus 4 x 25kg (220#). That's about 1540 lbs behind the driver's seat.
Well, it can be done, but it turns out that the small bulge in the back right tire was more significant than the moderate tread. The sidewall blew out about 30 km from Kumbo. We inflated the spare and headed down the road. The spare looked fair, but when leaving the road briefly to make room for a laden motorcycle proved too much for it. Now, to find a 3rd sacrificial tire. My riding companion, our church landlord, had an idea. He commendeered a motorcycle taxi out from under its customer. Off to Lassin. He found a car just like ours, but he did not find the owner. No problem, the spare was removed and he motored back to me. This time, the issue was a borrowed tire with bulges again. Can you imagine how gingerly I drove the last couple miles to our house?

The next day, Wednesday, I delivered the cement in two loads to the school.

Thursday, off to Kumbo by taxi to buy 4 tires. The fronts had threads showing, the spares were in shreds, and the stolen tire still had the bulges. This leaves the back right in pretty good shape. Hey, life should be exciting. In Kumbo, no used tires looked encouraging, and the new Chinese stuff looked little better. A fellow at a really nice tire shop assured me that he could get good Firestone tires for a reasonable price and have them delivered on Friday. It takes faith to live this way, but I paid him and went home.

Friday afternoon, Gerald the very responsible taxi driver pulled up with 4 of the most beautiful tires tied to his car. Sunday, Emanuel put them on. I returned the stolen spare and included the 2 badly worn tires as spare spares; Frank was grateful. I confessed and he said 'no problem'.

Since then, the little red car has kept up with the cement demands.
Classroom 2, Jessica's room is completed. Carol's room has a new floor and the inside plastering is coming.

Termites... Well, it seems that Jessica was harboring the little bugs under the front right seats. This is a problem as the dirt floor can eventually give way, leading to the loss of students and their desks.
It's hard to replace those desks. Gregory has exposed their nest and poisoned them.

Our consumption of cement is about 1/2 complete and the funds are holding out well- thank you so much!

This next Sunday we plan to mark the boundaries of the school officially and record it with the government. This is really exciting. Note- only about 1/3rd of ALL SCHOOLS in this region have their boundaries marked. Amazing.

Soon, really soon, we'll have high speed, pay as you go Internet at the house. This will allow us to send photos and perhaps short movies. We can hardly wait to show you the progress.

We're still looking for new project leaders for next year. Contact Babi at GMI if you have or have become a lead.

God bless,
Steve & Carol Rose