The Greeks are here!!

  Wow! I cannot believe that it is Sunday night already.... Sorry for such a delay with my posting. Internet here at Bethel has been spotty... and I have been tired!

   So you know that truck that was supposed to arrive at the end of last week from South Africa with all of our supplies on it for the air conditioning job? Well it didn't actually arrive on the day it was supposed too. Nor did it arrive on the next day, or the next. Fast forward a week, last Wednesday night, when it finally arrived!! The poor brothers overseeing the work were exercising great patience. The days leading up to it allowed us to get semi prepared, with me and another sister, Laura, finishing up with some pipe insulation in the main room and the brothers trying to get everything else in order. When Thursday morning came we felt like we were all set to finally get under way....but of course there are always set-backs.. especially in Congo. For instance,  getting the forklift stuck in the loose gravel for about an hour; not being able to find the correct screws for the sheet metal; unrolling insulation to find that it is way to old and disgusting to even be used, rolling it back up without inhaling any of the nasty dust...... But then, you get under way and into the swing of things:)

We had to first unload all of the metal and figure out where to store it. Originally we set it all by the outer wall, near our "building and insulation" center. Security quickly let us know that that was not a good idea, as in the night it could easily be stolen by someone on the other side of the wall. So we had to move all the pieces again. Laura and I had a bit of fun as we moved all the pieces.. 
Then the building and wrapping! It was nice to be able to start doing something that I felt I really knew had to do (thank you HVAC crew with the RBC) Although our materials that we have here are much poorer quality and you really have to make do with what you have, it was great to see it all start to come together. True, we are far off from it ALL coming together, but it is still nice to be a part of. Due to the fact that the truck was so late, we all ended up working on Saturday, 7:45am to 6pm. Yikes!! It was super hot that day too. And, I will admit, that by 4pm I was hot, very sweaty, super itchy, and just down right exhausted that I so badly wanted to call it a day! Just about that time though, the temperature seemed to change, getting cooler, and I was able to manage another few hours. Plus, we actually had two brand new members to our crew that day. For the past week  we had been hearing about  couple from Greece that were coming. Brian started calling them "the Greeks"and pretty soon the rest of us joined in. We were all anxiously awaiting "the Greeks"arrival! Turns out that Petros and Stella could not wait to get started working, so much that they gladly volunteered to have their first day be on a day we were not even supposed to be working!! It was so nice to have some fresh faces to help us out, especially as they were all new and energised, which helped keep the rest of us going. The yummy Greek candy they brought to share with us also helped. Petros and Stella are the first international volunteers from Greece, ever!! It is very rare for couples to even here about doing this sort of thing, they said. So neat that we get to work with them. I only hope that they don't get tired of all the jokes about plate and cup smashing! ( Stella told me that they actually don't ever do this in Greece;)
  Today I took a much needed rest, skipping service to sleep in. Since I missed my French meeting yesterday I went to the English one that is here on Sundays at 11:30am. Then I spent the afternoon at the pool!! So nice:)