Monday 14 May 2007

Mood: Tired
Song in mind: Boys 2 Men-Doing Just Fine
First Site: Entokozweni Primary school
Mission: Present concept of skip and hop to principal
Other Site: Chess Park
Mission: To complete digging and lay Foundation

We arrived late at the school for the presentation, but luckily it was only by 10 minutes (being the Schumaeker that I am). Khula and I performed the presentation in front of the principal and one of the governing body members. They fell in love with the concept and immediately agreed that we should carry on with the project.

In the meantime, ON THE OTHER SITE...

"Aluta Continua...., the struggle continues." The digging continued since last week Friday. Some areas had been dug up to the 500 mm depth and we were attempting to maintain the same depth throughout the foundation. I must admit that we had become quite the pro’s on using the pick. As we came to a consensus with the contractor that the foundations were deep enough, we decided to move to the centre to remove all unwanted grass, so as to prepare the soil for compaction.

We encountered a problem during the morning. The contractor had left the site without reporting to us and seemed as if he was not returning. We called for an emergency meeting amongst the "army generals" and we decided that before any decisions to relieve the contractor of his duties were to be taken, we would enquire of his absence from Anthony Shoba, a friend and Chess Club owner, who reported that he assigned two other gentlemen for the task as he seemed not to be happy with the financial agreements. We decided to work with the new contractor as time was against us.

Though the material delivery truck was late, we fortunately, managed to mix the concrete at the centre of the chessboard and was poured into the foundation. The mixture consisted of six wheelbarrow fulls of sand, three of aggregate, two cement bags (50 kg each) and water. The one contractor reported that he had been doing this type of work for over 50 years and was highly experienced. He said that he was involved in the construction of the factory adjacent to the N17 highway, yet, after it was complete, he went to request for employment and they refused. He seemed very frustrated by this.

On realizing that we would run out of river sand during the mix, we decided to go and order more from the Builders Warehouse, however, they couldn’t deliver the same day, so we directed to a neighbouring company that sells river sand and aggregate, who agreed to deliver the same day. The materials arrived on site at about 17H00, where some of us had to return to school. We left Kasia on site to ensure the rest of the mixing and pouring would be carried out efficiently. Another adventurous and exciting day at Kwa-Thema had come to an end.