Construction

The other side of construction is, quite frankly, destruction. Destruction happens by sledgehammers, collisions, hungry dogs, and laziness, just to name a few.

Let's begin with demolition. Here in Malawi, much in the way of construction is by modification of the current set of circumstances with a sizable hammer, the bigger the better. While most Americans half-heartedly apply that mantra, no Malawi would forgo the chance to voice a firm "Amen!" or some similar word. I have probably said this before (and will most likely say it again), but construction need not be preceded by demolition in all cases. Furthermore, constructing correctly now will result in less demolition and construction [insert appropriate length of time ranging from 10 seconds to two score] later. However, incorrect construction is job security for most people. If you build it with the intent of having it break tomorrow, you will get called back tomorrow.

I know I just went to Mt. Mulanje last week, but this Sabbath, the Lutz family, Hayton family, and I piled into Nancy the Land Cruiser (9 people in 8 seats). Last time, we visited on Friday. This, being the weekend, meant everybody, their brother, brother's friend, and brother's friend's uncle were available to peddle their wares. Culture lesson: personal space shrinks from about this big (spread arms to full reach) to this big (put hands in pockets with arms plastered against ribs). Not even the walls of a 3 ton behemoth prevent this. Wes, being adventurous and knowing I have experience with ziplines, decided we needed to hook one up across the pool below the waterfall (see pictures from last week). After climbing up rock faces, using tow straps for webbing (which work well by the way), and doing a host of other things, lunch time came. Lunch was followed by more ratcheting and tightening. We were using the rope Wes had at home, about a 9.8 mm static climbing rope (sometimes used for rescues or other things but never for actual climbing). Static climbing rope is a type of rope that's not very stretchy. In the olden days, not very stretchy meant no stretch whatsoever. Modern "non-stretchy" ropes stretch about 7 or 8% (modern dynamic climbing ropes stretch as much as 30% to break falls slowly instead of breaking the climber's back or neck). 7% doesn't sound like much until you try to compensate for it with no handy tools. After much blood and sweat (sorry, no tears from me but the munchkins made up for my insufficiencies), I was ready (read: not at all hopeful). Shedding shoes and shirt, I began bounding down the rocks waiting for the rope to support me. I made it to the water, but only barely. Thus began and ended the service of said zipline. No signifiant bodily harm done, just some minor cuts and scrapes. Probably not even battle scars. In lieu of the aforementioned failure, I was relegated to cliff jumping. Acceptable? I suppose.

Oh the joy instilled in the heart at the sound of a nice piano. Cristy, one of the doctors here, brought a baby grand piano from the States. Cristy also has a dog named Bella. When Bella was younger and slightly less mentally developed, she decided the wires in the bottom of the piano needed some modification and proceeded to chew the ends off all of the cords. What cords you ask? The cords powering the dehumidifier to ensure the piano never reaches the state of untunability. It has survived one wet season fairly well, but who would want to chance another? Side note: outlets here are strange. While they have three prongs, European plugs don't work. American don't work. Not even the international plugs work. One would think all the Americans would have spare USA plugs lying around since they don't work in the outlets. Strangely enough, no. After scavenging for a bit and assigning some things to be available, I had two of the three needed plugs. Some quick wiring stuff and voila, the dehumidifier works, or at least two of the three heaters. Once a third plug is located, the dehumidifier should be back in business. Morals of the story? Dogs, while often friendly, have habits which can be hazardous in a variety of ways. Second part: improvisation and doing what needs to be done. If new heaters had been available, I might never have needed to do this. However, since they weren't available, I did something that would have worried me sick a month ago. Electrical stuff is not my specialty, but it isn't anyone else's either. It's not just me though. Last night, a few of us were sitting around after vespers and even the doctors are doing things they would never have imagined. Lots of American and British medical students who visit say they learn less in a year of medical school than they do in under a month here. Doctors get to treat all kinds of things and surgeons are cutting at the limits of their knowledge. Are they doing these things in any sort of unsafe manner? Absolutely not! They do their research and homework, but specialists don't really exist here and therefore the general doctors specialize in everything.

Elde Paladar, a Philippino working here at the hospital, has been in the process of creating a new lab for the hospital where the students from the college of health science can come to watch and learn. He has been planning, acquiring materials, and supervising the construction. They have been gutting, retiling, installing cabinets and sinks, etc. Sadly, the laborers try to cut corners at all possible junctions. There are, on occasion, alternative ways of doing something and achieving perfectly acceptable results. These would be called perfectly acceptable alternative ways of doing something, not laziness. I know all these corner cutting measures actually cost him more money because the workers then get the pleasure of going back and doing it right.

I should probably take notes on people management from Elde. Very soon, I will likely be the director/supervisor for an entire water system construction project. The question is where. Until the end of this week, the plan was for me to move north to Rwanda in the beginning of November. However, the donors have suddenly decided they want to install a chlorinated storage tank instead of letting us build a water system. The problem is far more basic. The hospital already has a storage tank, but the tank is empty. Adding a storage tank doesn't make water appear. Several other things have happened that have made the next 5 weeks more uncertain than the lottery. Could be interesting. Please keep these projects in your prayers.