Monday, December 21, 2009

From the field in Mali, Dec 21

Final update here from Mali; the team is back in Timbuktu (TB2) now doing final debriefs; project has gone very well, just a few problems to sort out; villages and school directors are very happy and look forward to working with us all again next year.

One quote we received "most NGO's just send money and leave us to solve all the problems with their projects, NomadHope, Adjmor, & Rotary came with an 'army' to help us!"

Farach had a small party for us yesterday, to celebrate our success there. the pipeline and tapstand are done and the children began using it yesterday. The soak pit is almost finished, should be done tomorrow. The lights are all working in every classroom and the school Director's office too. And finally the Cyber Copy Center is all up and running, just waiting on the internet key to arrive from Bamako and the Director will get some more training onsite in a week or two. The application everyone seems to be excited about there is the photo ID cards everyone must have, which before the Farach copy center required all to pay for transport to Goundam or TB2 to have ID's made, until now!

The school fencing is still being planned, and very important; Adjmor and I are getting bids today.
Zouera classroom lights are all working too, but the tapstand is not producing water yet, it arrives just to the tapstand and stops; we have some engineers discussing options with us here and will push to solve this soon. Could be the pressure at the source or a stoppage in the pipeline. This is very dissappointing to everyone, but we committed to find a solution soon.

The Millet grinding machine is a big hit in Zouera and the first women arrived yesterday to pay for using it ! Some are paying in millet and sorghum if they have no money, which the school will sell at market for cash, but many are able to pay cash. The only problem there is the lack of confidence the operator has in being left alone with the machine, which we believe he will overcome with time working alone. We agreed to have Adjmor go back in a month to check on him and see if more training is needed.

We leave tomorrow for a short break before going home, I am very sad to leave, as always.


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