Last updated Sunday, February 22, 2009
Photo Gallery
Click here and here for project photos. (There are two separate links due to the volume of photos).
Dedication Ceremony Video
Click here to download the 16 minute video that was shown at the January 25th Dedication Ceremony.
Progress Diary
Below are updates on the work completed. See the link above for project photos.
Saturday, February 14, 2009 - From Rome - Project Completion
Hello Everyone!
Well, I've been back for 10 days and I still don't feel the least bit like I did before I left in November....
I just wanted to say thank you to all of you.
There is absolutely no doubt that you have changed the way a few thousand people think about themselves and about the world.
You made things better for them.
You made them smile.
Oh yeah, and you built an awesome looking hall ;-)
For me, I watched this project truly become an exchange of time, talent and treasure....we too think differently and that was the goal.
THANK YOU ANN for being such a fabulous communicator, web master and financial detail wizard!
It is clear to me that Lesotho can't have been a one time thing.
So, Ann and I are heading to Peru in April to scout out the next community with which we might work.
(After all, can builders of projects really go through life without seeing Machu Picchu???)
The thinking is that we would schedule the project for this coming November, December and January.
In the meantime, we are looking forward to the visit from Catherine and Emmanuel, which is now scheduled for Feb 23 - Mar 14.
Catherine is coming for sure, Emmanuel hopes to succeed in his third try for a visa on Monday.
You will hear from us shortly about a reunion party date.
Thank you again for all your hard work and dedication.
Monday, January 26, 2009 - from Ann
Hi all,
I'm writing from Amsterdam on way home from Lesotho, still warm in the glow of the dedication ceremony, and wanted to send a quick email to share.
While you may not have been there in person, you were very much there in spirit. Throughout the course of the 6.5 hour ceremony (2.5 hour mass and 4 hour ceremony), "the Lake Union" was thanked and recognized often. While I wish everyone could have been there, the GREAT NEWS is that Craig Savio, one of the week 10 volunteers, video-taped nearly the entire ceremony. Upon his return (I think sometime next week, after safari) we'll figure out a way to get a copy to all who are interested.
The morning began with the hanging of a large framed sign listing all the students, teachers, volunteers and donors who made this project possible. You can imagine the clamor of students looking for their names... it was almost as much of a magnet as photos of themselves.
The ceremony itself began at 10am (was scheduled for 9am, but it's Lesotho time :) with a processional of the students, followed by the bishop and other officiants, the sisters, the volunteers, and the choir. As always, the singing was wonderful and moving, even without understanding a word of it. This was followed by the 2.5 hour mass (original plan was a 1 hour 'short mass' - not sure what happened with that plan), the first 30 minutes of which was in the blazing sun (except for the bishop who was in the shade of the hall). While still outside, the bishop blessed the building, sprinkled the entire west face with water as part of that ceremony, and after the ribbon cutting, continued the blessing and sprinking inside.
Once inside, mass proceeded, which was followed, without break, by 22 other speakers, singers, and dance acts. The hall was jam-packed with dozens standing in the back where ever they could find room, as well as the scores of students squeezing around the windows and doors. I think much of the local community was in attendance. In preparation many of the nuns and teachers were up all night cooking, and fed everybody at the close of the ceremony. I'm guessing there were close to 1,000 people there.
You'll see for yourself when you watch Craig's video, but I just wanted to mention here the recognition given Rome and all of us throughout the ceremony. They clearly appreciated how many hands joined by a common goal can make great things happen. They are very excited about this hall and all it means to the school and the broader community. Furthermore they acknowledged all the other components of the project, including the mattresses, irrigation, water reticulation (bore holes, tanks, etc), and as Catherine put it, "the state of the art toilets". Dignitaries from as far as Maseru came, as well as the Principal Chief of the region, all singing the praises of this effort and the importance of maintenance of it. Furthermore many of them heartily and gratefully acknowledged that this project was led by women and was an example of what women can achieve in Lesotho.
I made a short movie about the project itself, which was aired near the start of the ceremony. Catherine scheduled it there to help give visitors who had not been part of the project some sense of the project background and purpose. As you can imagine, the kids loved seeing themselves and the movie was well received. I'll post a copy of it online when I get home.
One of the most touching parts of the ceremony to me, aside from the well-deserved recognition of Rome and her leadership, was the performance of two thank you songs, one written by the students and one by Nkwele, one of the teachers. The songs were beautiful, and the stage was full of students, each one holding a large sign with one of our names on it. While the singers lowered the volume of their song, each of our names was read aloud as the student holding the respective sign stepped forward - very cool.
Okay, I'll leave the rest of the detail to Craig's video, and get on with a project update.
As of Monday afternoon, the 3rd septic system, the one next to the girls' dorm, had been sealed. Additional concrete block walls were built to block in the toilets from the open field, making them accessible from only within the girls' dorm area. Thabang said they needed the privacy. :) The toilets will be set in place by Wednesday at the latest, as that is the final day of the project.
The sound system was installed last week and volunteer Martha Wiggin now possesses an honorary PhD in sound mixology. She figured out all the connections, knobs and buttons and now there is sound that can rattle the building. In fact, the building was rattling on Sunday night after the ceremony, when we had about an hour long dance party in the hall - they kids are beside themselves with joy and energy over this new feature.
Other finishing work is happening, including building brick steps up to the toilets, cleaning up dropped concrete blobs from along the paths to the toilets, the finishing of the paver area in front of the hall, mounting of the final sandstone window trim pieces and grouting of them, and paiting the window glazing.
During Monday morning's work session, our week 10 volunteer Perry Estevenin, an artist, brought up the idea of painting a mural. The volunteers were abuzz with the idea and the most recent version of the plan that I know of was to paint it on the outside wall of the building that was our workshop, on the wall that faces the new hall. They were planning to project a Seattle image on the wall, using the new LCD projector, to be able to trace an outline of the skyline and then use the left over black paint to fill in the pertinent parts to complete an abstract image of Seattle. We're also planning on writing all of our names as a border around the mural. All of those ideas may have morphed between 3pm when I left and that evening when they were working on it - I can't wait to see the photos.
Almost time to board the plane so I'll sign off here. Please be sure to put Feb 11 on your calendar - that's our celebration date with Catherine and Emmanuel at the boathouse. I can't wait to see you all there and hear everybody's stories.
Peace, joy and thanks to all!
Ann
Saturday, January 24, 2009 - from Ann
It's Saturday in Lesotho - less than 24 hours to the dedication ceremony. It's a very exciting day at the site. The sound system has been installed, including 2 microphones, 4 large speakers, 2 woofers, and a big mixer box. It really is impressive and the students are like bees to honey. This morning they weren't allowed in the hall as we did final preparation for the afternoon choir practice, but they were all around the windows like kids in a candy shop, especially when we tested a video that included all of them, and when John played the keyboard with Tshabo on vocals. Lots of smiles.
There's also crazy busy work going on in front of the hall today, in an attempt to get all pavers laid. The checkerboard is in place and other patterns are emerging.
The two main septic systems are operational now. I even found a cow sitting peacefully next to the boys' septic system this morning.
A bit of good news for those who know Tabiso. He looks thin but seems fine, and is back at achool now.
Some more good news for those in Seattle - we plan to tape as much of tomorrow's ceremony as possible, although it is supposed to be about 4 hours long. Two choirs, perhaps the arch bishop, and I don't know what all. It's promising to be a great day. And we'll post what we can online.
All the best,
Ann
Sunday, January 18, 2009 - from Rome
Hello everyone!
Sorry that this will be short but we are working extra long days this week to get ready for the Grand Opening Ceremony. It appears there will be TV, radio and newspaper people attending.
The week 8 team became known as the Completion Team… They poured the last squares of concrete floor, they fully installed the hardwood floor on the stage and applied 2 of the 8 coats of polyurethane sealer. They also finished the sandstone keystones and finished piping and backfilling both drain fields. My hero Anna did all the math on complicated angles for the stairs to the stage which also got framed (by the way I screwed your piece of plywood with all your calculations to one of the stair stringers and put your name on it!)
This week’s team is installing the hardwood flooring on the crazy complicated but gorgeous stairs leading to the stage. We are also installing the 16 new toilets, laying the stone walkways and 10,000 pacers in front of the hall as a courtyard which will include a human-size chess board pattern in the middle.
Lastly, you’ll be pleased to know that today we finally got the ‘shit-pit’ pumped out, installed a new pipe for the one the cow broke and graveled the whole bottom of it. Then I took a bleach shower ;)
Tomorrow is the first day of school here and once again there are whole classes of kids coming to help….. Yikes!!!!
Have a wonderful day!!!
Rome
Saturday, January 10, 2009 - from Ann
Hi all,
Rome did not have time to send an update this week because they worked late on Saturday in an effort to get the floor done in time to return the cement mixers tomorrow! This is a significant achievement as we have had those mixers since mid-November and they have run every day since - very exciting! Anyway, I'll fill in what I know and we can look forward to more details when she comes up for a breather.
The girls septic tank was sealed this week and is ready for the structure to be built above it to support the porta-potties. The boys' septic system will be sealed during week 8 and ready for its porta-potties. School starts again on Jan 19 so these will be in place and functioning by then.
Apparently a cow actually fell into the hole of the 3rd septic tank on Wednesday. Neither Rome nor I saw it, but Rome said there were some men on the school grounds that day who had experience getting cows out of holes and were able to rescue it unharmed. I guess there was a reason there was a lot of water in it still - cushioned the blow no doubt. What isn't clear is how it happened in the first place as cement block had been set all around the hole to avoid just that eventuality. Sigh! Anyway, pumping out and bricking in that hole is coming up for week 9 or 10 volunteers.
Work on the stage continues. The warped wood has slowed down the construction pace but as of Wednesday, the stringers were in for the stairs, the front skirt was in place, a third of the risers and treads were in, and Rome thought the stairs would go much more quickly from there forward. The final plywood on the stage itself was laid in place after the skirt was on, so it is getting very near the time to begin laying the final mahogany planking. With the building dedication only 2 weeks from today this too is a major priority.
The wiring for the speakers should be taking place on Tuesday. I'm not sure if the speakers will be put in place on that day as the building is not yet securable, but that too will be done by 1/25.
I am often asked if there will be work to do for the week 9 and 10 volunteers. Rest assured, there is still much to be done: glazing the windows, sealing the floor, laying and staining the stage, building under-stage storage system, landscaping, assembling the porta-potty system, building the third septic system, and other things I'm not thinking of right now. So roll up your sleeves and get ready for the final push! :)
Some more photos have been posted here. A good week to all and as always, thank you for your spirit and generosity!
Saturday, January 3, 2009 - from Rome
Hello Everyone!
The holiday weeks around here have been a bit chaotic but we've been cranking on getting things done.
They have decided that Sunday, January 25th will be the grand opening and the heat is on to get ready. It seems the guest list will be huge and the vistors have been increasing every day recently. Lots of cheering and joy when people show up.
Another piece of news is that a generous donor has made it possible to fly Catherine and Emmanuel to Seattle! They will arrive February 8th and leave March 1st. We'll be sure to throw a huge party....date to be determined soon. They are of course both beside themselves with excitement!
Today was a very special day for all of us. One of our volunteers from a couple of weeks ago asked that we make arrangements for the boys who are here working every single day to get to go and buy themselves a new pair of shoes. A few more people pitched into the idea, we made a list of the (18 )boys who are always working and told them yesterday that they should prepare to be taken somewhere for a surprise at noon on Saturday (today).
We loaded up both vans with the 18 boys and all of us and Emmanuel and took them to the LCS store (whom we warned yesterday). They each had 300 Rand to spend ($30 each) and they were completely blown away. It was clear that many of them had never 'shopped' for anything, so it was a challenge for some of them to figure out how to pick a pair, try them on for size and figure out how much money they had left to buy socks or a shirt. 3 boys bought something for their mom with their change....very cool.
The boys sang all the way home in both vans and were still singing as they walked across the courtyard with their bags of new shoes. Thanks Lee-Lee for the great idea! Wish you were here to see it play out!
We had Tsabo buy shoes for Thabiso, who went home to Maseru on New Years Day because he had gotten very weak over the last several days. He has 'the bad flu' which is what they call AIDS here, and was one of our most consistant boys, even as he was losing weight fast.
It's been an emotional few weeks around here.
On the progress side, we got 2 of the 3 septic tanks built and partially piped to the drain field. A cow walked too close to the 3rd one and it caved in on one side, breaking the pipe, yes, the same fricking one we struggled to repair last week!
We also built the stage, painted the back wall inside and out and have built the template for the stairs to the stage in a cool pattern. Hardwood floor goes down next.
The sand stone keystones have been sealed and are ready to install.
We've been pouring concrete floor squares every day, with 9 being the most in any one day!
So, the rain is falling at Joe's internet store and we are off to dinner in Ficksburg....whooooohooo!
Have a wonderful New Year and thanks again for the generosity of your spirit!!!
Saturday Dec 20 - From Rome
Hello again everyone and Happy Holidays!!!
I hear you have had snow in Seattle....it's 85 here during the day and a balmy 60ish in the evenings!
Many of you are asking if we are on schedule with construction items, and I'd say we are still a bit ahead of schedule, with the exception of the brick laying still going very slowly. We are dependent upon the brickwork being done, section by section in order for us to pour the floor squares and they are working in a pattern that allowed us to get the first 2 sections completed yesterday, but now we can't pour any more floor squares basically until we are completed with the brick all the way around the rest of the building.
On the bright side....the electrical system is basically complete although we are still connected to a temporary power location. We have to wait for the local officials to hook us to the permanent power pole. At present we are holding off on the solar power portion, as we are working on a few sanitation issues that turned out to be bigger than we first saw in April. We will likely do some solar hot water, but we can't make that decision for another week or so.
The irrigation system ran it's first temporary zone test to cheers and shouts from the kids and teachers. They actually excused themselves from the brick work scaffolding so they could see the sprinkler system sending water into the sky!!! We still have 2 more tanks to cut into the system and some more programming to do on the controller, but we'll have that done in a few days....holidays permitting.
The 175 mattresses arrived this week, sponsored by the funds being raised by HNA students in Seattle. At first the kids didn't really get that they would be theirs to sleep on until they graduated. Then after a while they understood what we were doing and all hell broke loose.....kids jumping up and down on them and being generally thrilled. They don't want us to remove the plastic covering they came wrapped in for transport, to make them last longer! These are hospital quality mattresses with waterproof coverings so they should be good for a long time. We had the kids do the task of removing the old pieces of board and foam and assorted mats on each bed because, as you can imagine, lots of crawly things had taken up residence there.
We are nearly complete with the construction of a new burn pit, which will have a roof on it this time, and then we'll demo the old one, which happens to be currently located a few feet away from the new building.
Tomorrow the new construction type toilets will arrive and we'll start building them new sewage containment vaults in the ground and having the excavation machine collapse the old outhouses into their own broken pits, putting the new dirt from the excavation over them and creating a 'grassy knoll' where they once were. For those of you who have already been here, you can imagine the relief it will be to get this mess taken care of. Basically, we are building completely new retention tanks in the ground out of CMU blocks, and installing cleanable 'porta-pottie' type facilities on top of the new vaults. Each of the 3 vaults will be properly piped to a drain field. In addition we will run a pipe using rain water run-off across the front of the 'drop area' to rinse it and keep it clean.
The sandstone window/door trim and sill pieces are set out in a room to dry and be sealed before they get installed.
Our 2 major projects that will be underway on Monday will be the toilet vaults and the construction of the stage platform...finally. Can't wait to see how many versions of the stair stringers we'll have to cut before they are right!
So, stay warm and know that we think about you all often.....those who've already connected here and those of you yet to join us!
Saturday Dec 13
As the holiday's approach, various groups of students keep coming back to work on the project, while others switch off and head to relatives. Carol will be cooking a big holiday dinner on the 25th for those who are here working their butts off....the kids are great! The brick laying continues with the first 2 sections (from the back) being done and both sides done up to the window sill level. On Monday the welders come to set the steel headers for the 8 big windows and then we start laying across the top and sides of the windows toward the front of the building. Yesterday we finished pouring the concrete slab floor squares that will be under the stage area. It's all curing now and we start building the stage on Monday. We were able to find solid tongue and grove Muranti planking (their version of mahogany) for the final stage floor....it's beautiful wood. Now we have to find a product to finish it with!!! No such thing as swedish finish here. We'll look at our next trip to JoBurg. Today we got all the remaining irrigation sprinkler piping and heads set. All that's left if to set the pumps and switches and it will be a working system. Electrician coming on Wednesday to wire the controller.
Sunday Dec 7
Rome reported today that they have been busy laying irrigation pipe and bricklaying. About 1/3rd of the sprinkler heads for the irrigation have been set and the bricklaying is coming along. A decision was made to have the mortar specialists lay the exterior brick and the volunteers lay the interior brick. It's slow work but it's coming along. It helps to have the specialists laying the outside course as it give the less experienced volunteers a guide to go by.
Sunday Nov 30
Finished moving brick, finished filling in old retention tank, continued to grade north berm. Began painting windows.
Through Saturday Nov 29
Raked and seeded north berm (located between new building and school garden), dug a ditch to install irrigation pipes and moved bricks in preparation for laying. 4 water tanks were delivered - 2 for the new building and 2 to replace old asbestos tanks. Windows and doors also delivered
Wednesday Nov 26
Roofing work begun; bucket brigade of kids moved bricks onto site; work begun on concrete block wall at the back side of the building.
Tuesday Nov 25
Roof trusses set in place; supply shopping.
Monday Nov 24
The building columns were put in place and the rest of the gravel was spread around the entire floor space of the building.
Thursday Nov 20 - Saturday Nov 22
Concrete was mixed and poured into the foundation. The steel erection has been moved up and begins on Monday, Nov 24.
Wednesday Nov 19
The footing gravel was compressed, the rebar cages to support the foundation were added and wired in place, and forms to support the foundation were constructed.. All is ready for concrete.
Tuesday Nov 18
The footer was additionally prepped for the steel beams that will be erected in early December. The footers were leveled to within 2 cm and gravel was added all around. An entire classroom helped with this last step and it was done in 40 minutes. Yes, we'll be doing a little QC first thing in the morning. :)
Monday Nov 17
Today was a BIG day. We wired the last of the foundation cages. The grading of the site was finished. The exact building site was determined, measured and lined, and the footing trenches were dug. We took delivery of 3 trucks of gravel, one of sand and a compactor. Some gravel distribution into the footing trenches began. It was a 13 hour day, we're beat, and students, teachers and volunteers alike have big smiles on their faces.
Sunday Nov 16
Grading continued. Assembly of the rebar cages continued, as well as rebar pad to be used in the foundation to support the steel upright beams. More shopping for supplies (although most stores are not open here on Sundays).
Saturday Nov 15
Groundbreaking took place at 8am today! Assembly began on rebar cages to be used in the foundation.
Friday Nov 14
Work has begun!! A classroom next to the building site has been set up with tools and first aid supplies. The site was surveyed for initial grading measurements and we went shopping for tools and supplies.
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