We got a bit of a late start this morning. First of all, we had to pick up some petrol for the generator and some fittings for the pipes from the irrigation store. Then it was the hour-long trek on rain-soaked roads into Olosheki. More rain last night meant more muddy roads this morning. As we entered the property, we noticed that our second vehicle, which was right behind us, was no longer behind us. From the base of the water tower, we could see the Land Cruiser, sideways on the road. They had slid into one of the many deep puddles and had buried the rear wheel.
All the Maasai guys that were working for us gathered around and tried to push the vehicle out, but to no avail. So Dave went back there with the truck and managed to pull the Land Cruiser out. With the roads as bad as they are, I’m a little surprised this hasn’t happened more often.
First order of business was to tip the tank upright. Not so easy since it is at the top of a 20-foot tower. It took six guys to do this task. At one point a couple guys were pushing from one side and another was pushing from another side and they were pushing against each other. You can hear Joy in the video yelling at Alex to come out because he was pushing against everyone else. The tank finally fell into place with a satisfying thump and no one fell off the tower.
We’ve kept our guardian angels busy the last few days.
One the tank was upright, then we could proceed with running all the plumbing and taking care of some details on the tower. Once the inlet plumbing was connected, we again heard the sound of water falling into the bottom of the tank. A most satisfying sound.
The Maasai boys have been digging trenches the last couple days to run the water to various points in the property. We connected pipes to lay in those trenches and did a pressure test at one point. And there it was. Running clean water. Something very scarce in these parts.
A couple of Maasai women were hired to prepare lunch for all the Maasai boys that were working here. It was interesting to watch this all happen. Several women and a bunch of kids were gathered under a small tree for most of the day, doing the meal preparation and washing the dishes afterwards. The cooking is done over a small hole dug in the ground. Foraged sticks are the fuel for the fire and the pan sits right on the ground over the fire pit.
We’ve had bread baked this way a couple of times. They will bake bread by putting the dough in the pot in a little bit of oil and then heaping coals on the lid. I managed to take a picture just as Mary was removing the lid to check on the bread. We will be having this bread at tea time tomorrow.
We had our first customers shortly after turning the water on. A couple of Maasai women came by with large water jugs and filled them up with the water flowing from the well. We pray that a lot more in this area will benefit from this clean water.
We’ll probably finish here tomorrow. The tower needs an actual ladder, the tank needs a means of shutting off the flow of water when it is full, pipe needs to be laid, and we may even be hanging an entrance gate. We’ve worked under the watchful eye of a flock of sheep for the last couple of days and this property is one of the growing number of properties in this area marked off by a fence. The days of nomadic animal herding are numbered and we will often see herds of cattle being driven between the fence rows or down the street, or even right through the middle of Narok. There’s less and less space for them to roam.
A few more pictures from today:
Two of the Maasai workers, proudly wearing their t-shirts that were gifted to them. That’s not a top hat, that’s the water tank that just happened to jump into the picture.
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