Rain, rain and more rain

The rains have been relentless the last week, raining most of each day. They have been trying to get things done around the house, but it is difficult when you are stuck inside most of the day. Ashlee finally broke down and did laundry in the rain. She said there was only about two hours of sun in the afternoon, but they couldn't wait any longer to get their clothes clean.
Andy and Ashlee have been spending most of their time on the tree farm lately. It is about a 20 K bike ride to the site so they have been putting a lot of miles on their bikes. Andy has make the trip pretty much every day and Ashlee has been out 3 or 4 times this week as well. They go caught in the rain once and said they were soaked to the bone. Things are moving along and they are excited to see the progress. A man from the Embassy is making a trip to the NW province soon and would like see the tree farm and interview Joseph about it. They are very excited about the interest it is generating and the good publicity that will be a result.
Their supervisor was in town this week as there are soon to be two new volunteers coming to their district. They went with their boss to do site prep, which basically involves visiting the villages and letting them know that they will soon have a volunteers and give them a briefing of what they will be there to do. They also took their boss to the tree farm. It sounds like everyone if very impressed with their efforts so far. As mentioned before, the chief also wants to plant his own tree farm. This could be a very lucrative business as well as providing the building materials that could help improve the housing.
You have an example in the photos that were just uploaded the the Flickr account of a great use for the lumber: the new bridge. The children were crossing the bridge labeled the 'bad bridge' in the photos to go to school during the rainy season. Not something most American parents would ever allow. Andy helped them design and build the bridge with sturdy posts with concrete footings, and 2x decking that is raised well above the highest water level. You can also see in the photos how they regraded the path on either end of the bridge to raise the level. A concept American are very familiar with as it is how most highway intersections are addressed, but this was a new concept for them. Having lumber available would be a huge benefit in many ways.
Ashlee has just started working with a new man who has been frustrating her. She said he treats her like she is an idiot. He says things to her like: Didn't you study geography in school? And she has been snapping right back at him which I am sure was a surprise to him. He has been testing her every chance he gets. As he feels they couldn't possibly know anything about plants in their region. He has been having trouble with his banana plants and had Ashlee over to take a look and prove to them that he knew more about it than them. Ashlee proved that she did know what she was taking about and so now she is helping him with banana trees. Stubborn man! He spends time on the Internet and wanted to buy a tractor on Ebay and have it shipped to Zambia. He was asking Ashlee if he could do that. She told him he could but he should just to go to Lusaka and buy one as shipping would be a fortune. The tractor he found on Ebay was several years old and was was trying to explain to him that it could be a collector and may not be a functioning tractor. He could not understand why you would keep on old tractor just to look at. Antiques are a foreign concept.
We kept getting cut off on the phone due to the oncoming storm so that is all for now.

Christmas letter

Happy New Year from the Royal Solwezi

Andy and Ashlee enjoyed the New Year's in the Royal Solowezi a hotel in the Boma. The hotel had fireworks and live music but Ashlee soon bored of that an opted for a little TV time. The provincial house was full of volunteers and they were in need of a little peace and quite and ESPN. She said they got an American station and were able to watch a count down of the most significant events of the year. They thought it ironic how may they had not even heard of. Ashlee said they would be there for two nights and would go to the provincial house tomorrow after is settles down a little bit and do some cooking and Internet surfing done before going back to the village.

They said it was a good time for a break. They have both been pretty frustrated with village and their project lately. Right now all they are getting is a hand out and a "Give me Christmas". They are constantly asked to give them things and there is not nearly as much interest for learning how to do something.

Ashlee was full of American football comments after two days of ESPN. She couldn't believe Miami was in the playoffs and her only satisfaction in this year's Chief's season is that Detroit managed to be even more pathetic. That is a wound I am sure she rubs plenty of salt into for Andy. Some things never change.

A Zambian Christmas

Andy and Ashlee enjoyed their Christmas dinner with an interesting group of English speakers from across the globe at the American doctor's house. There were guests from Australia, England and the States and quite the potluck spread. We only spoke to them for a few minutes, but they seemed to be enjoying themselves. The weather was really hot which made it even harder for it to feel like Christmas.
They were thankful for the boxes the received from Aimee and Aundre, Clara, and Jerry and Wanda. They always love to receive gifts and always find Jerry's finds most interesting. This last box was a huge box of Luzianne Iced Tea bags, 100 slim jims and Halloween candy. They love every bit of it!
They dropped 5 rolls of film in the mail recently so hopefully I will have more photos posted soon.
Merry Christmas to all from the jungles of Africa! God Bless and let's keep them in our prayers always!

The Animal Report

Tosh

Ashlee and Andy have a new puppy and is name is Fuzzy Nut. I wonder which of our beloved friends came up with that one. I am going to go out on a limb and say Andy. Actually the puppy belongs to one of the villagers' but he has started staying in Andy and Ashlee's gazebo so they have just sort of adopted him. Tosh didn't like it at first but and left home for a few days but is now back. He is a very friendly puppy and Ashlee says it feels good to come home to something that is happy to see you. Animals are not treated well by the people. That would be hard for someone like Ashlee who is such an animal lover to handle. That is why the animals come around their house a lot. Ashlee says it is kind of like the kids, be nice to them and they keep coming back. Andy's brother, sorry I am not sure which one, sent them some flea and tick shampoo and Ashlee washed him up. She said it killed about 90% of the fleas. His ticks were so bad they were between all his toes. It said on the bottle to shampoo for five minutes which Ashlee determined was physically impossible, but she did the best she could.
She was telling us about a parasite/maggot that gets into the laundry if they don't dry the clothes adequately before wearing them. They had gotten kind of lax on that until recently. She thought there was an infected bite on Fuzzy Nut's head so she tried to squeeze it to release the infection and she squeezed hard enough that a large maggot came out of the sore. If they do not adequately dry their clothes the parasite gets into the clothes and then buries under the skin. She said that her run in with the sore on the dog freaked her our enough to double dry the clothes. (Are we sure we are up for this trip guys?)
Ethel their chicken died. You can see the chicken house in the new pictures on the Fickr site or check this one:

Chicken hut

They now have a new chicken and they have named her Deep Fry since that is what will most likely happen to her in the end. Now that is keeping it real. Ashlee went to church on Sabbath and the benches that were built with the money donated by the Columbia SDA Church are finished and they will be done with the pulpit and chairs for the roster soon. The next project will be finish the floor and then bring electricity to the building.
The river is out and rising ever so slowing closer and closer to them. Most of their garden is coming up Andy had planted 6 new banana trees in their yard. It had been raining most of the week so they are pretty much house bound. Ashlee has been quilting and got a garbage bag of scraps from the tailor for 25 cents.
When Mom and Dad talked to them Ashlee wanted to know all about Carl Peterson (the Chief's GM that recently retired). She likes to keep up on the sport when she can.
An outbreak of Cholera has come into Zambia so they have been advised by PC on how to handle that with sanitation and chlorinating every thing they drink.
They are counting down the days until our visit. Ashlee has it marked on the calendar and it was only 136 days till we would be there for our visit.

The Mango: So sweet and yet so bitter

Ashlee was under the weather last week, She notices a blister like rash on her face and concentrated around her mouth which was extremely uncomfortable. She called up the PC and they said it is a common condition that volunteers run into. It is a poison ivy-like rash that is developed from the juices on freshly picked ripe mangoes. So the fruit that she has been impatiently waiting on for months now has now created some serious heartache. The solution? She must take care when picking the fruit and then thoroughly rinse it and let it sit out for several hours and then she can enjoy. A bit less instant gratification, but definitely better than a blistered face. She said she took some benadryl and was out of it for over a day waiting for it to go away.
The weather had been changing all day when we spoke today. It started out cloudy and switched to sunny and 92 degrees and had been rained most of the evening. The rain at night makes sleep a challenge even with ear plugs. At least their roof doesn't leak, which is more than their friend Sarah can say. She had to sleep under a poncho a few nights to keep from getting soaked. Her village is supposed to help her rethatch her roof so that should make things a lot better for her.
Andy and Joseph have been working on getting a tree farm together. The recently met with the chief and they made the presentation to him about he tree farm and he liked it so much he gave them 50 hectares (1 hectare = 2.47 acres) of land to start the tree farm and promised them more land when the first one was completed. The chief was going to also start a tree farm on his own land.
Ashlee had been working with a nurse from the local hospital (from Hong Kong or Singapore) on the malnutrition they were seeing in the babies and small children admitted to the hospital. They identified the children admitted for malnutrition and then visited the villages where these children came from to try and teach about how to avoid malnutrition. They visited many of these villages, using a car to get so far and then walking several miles per day throughout the villages to visit the families and learn about their diet. Ashlee said it took 45 minutes to ride her bike from home into the hospital each morning and then she leave from there to visiting the villages, and then return to the hospital and she ride her bike 45 minutes home again. It makes for a long but rewarding day.
One of the things they are trying to introduce is the use of peanuts as a source of available protein. The villages have peanuts, or ground nuts as they call them, but apparently need help in understanding how to use and store for prolonged supplies. They also have a funded project to introduce soybeans into the villages as an even better crop from a nutritional standpoint. She is working on teaching the villages how to plant, harvest and store. She was going to create a manual on the techniques for future Peace Corps volunteers as several of these villages are scheduled to get volunteers placed in them in the next year. It seems like there are high times and lows working as a volunteer, but this works seems to be rewarding for them both and they are seeing progress in their work.

Note from an American wife

Got a text from Ashlee today:

"Someone asked how much Andy paid dad for me today."

I told her next time to tell them that he is still paying.