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Friday, March 18, 1977, 7:00 am, Day 416

Well, the party came out better than I expected, but not as good as John had expected. I figure there are about 15 Peace Corps here. John was hoping for 25 to 30, so it turns out that he will stand to lose a bit on this party. The first people came about 10:00 am yesterday and quickly got to work butchering the sheep that John bought. By 2:30 I think everyone was here, and so we all went off to the river for a bit of swimming. This river looked to be a bit bigger than the Moa. On the way back from swimming, I saw about 10 monkeys crossing the road in front of me. That was the most monkeys I have seen so far.

The next thing on the agenda was a soccer game between Peace Corps and the Gbinte teachers. We had 8 Peace Corps playing so we filled out the team with three Sierra Leoneons. We played two 45-minute halves and were out-manuevered during the whole game. We were lucky to escape with only 2 goals being scored against us in a 2 to 0 loss. It was a good game and everyone enjoyed it.

Next was dinner. We had Irish stew, vegtable salad, and fruit salad. Nothing great, but it was good.

The last event for yesterday was a dance over at the court barrie. It was pretty good. There was a record player with a couple of big speakers. That, with the light bulbs, were run by an electric generator powered by gasoline. For the first half of the dance, I had the job of gatekeeper. I stood at the door, checking for invitations and collecting entrance fees. I also had to keep all of the kids under control that hang around outside, wanting to get in.

By midnight I was all danced out, finally, so I headed back to the house. Once there we ate some more and sat around and talked for awhile. The music from the dance could still be heard loud and clear. We finally went to bed. Everyone stayed the night. People are starting to get up and around now, and so I will also. The party should break up sometime today. I think that everyone has had a very enjoyable time.

Sunday, March 20, 1977, 9:00 pm, Day 418

John lost more on the party than I thought. I hear that he put out 370 leones for it and probably got back a little less than 200 leones. That leaves 170 leones, which seems quite a bit to pay for the privlige of having a party.

People started leaving by about 10 or 11 AM on Friday. I was the last to leave, and ended up spending more time there than I figured on. just when I was ready to leave, I got side-tracked by trying to get John's motorcycle to start. It took until 2:30 before I finally got it finished. I fixed just about everything on it, and just about everything needed adjusting. All regular maintenance had either been neglected or done wrong because John is just starting out on a motorcycle and I guess he is not too mechanicly inclined.

I arrived in Freetown that afternoon, and the first thing I did was take a bath. It was a sit-down one and it was good and long. I soaked off 6 weeks worth of ground in dirt from my body, something that you can't do with bucket baths. It felt great to finally be clean again.

Last night we had a big spagetti dinner at our house. Howard Grey, the Peace Corps director, was there along with some of the other volunteers. There were 11 people all together and we had a good time.

Today, I went with Fred up to a village around Kambia in the northeast. It was about 2.5 to 3 hours each way. We took the Peace Corps Puegeot 404 pickup and hauled some materials up there to install a hand pump in a well at a school. The well is going to be a demonstration well to show the agriculture volunteers how to construct wells and install pumps.

On the way back to Freetown, we stopped and did our good deed for the day. On the highway at one spot, sat a car body. It was once a Volkswagon van, but a few weeks ago, as it was driving along, it caught fire and burned completely. It has been sitting in the middle of the east-bound lane ever since then, and is just over the crest of a hill and so is a hazard, especially at night. When we stopped, there happened to be a few villagers around, who were willing to help us. Altogether, we were 8, and together we rolled the car off of the road. It is now laying upside down at the side of the road and I think it will probably end up staying there forever.

Tuesday, March 22, 1977, 11:00 pm, Day 420

These past few days I spent mostly going back over and redoing my Kamiendor design. I changed the number of taps from 7 to 13. Water taps and concrete standpipes don't cost that much and so I felt that it wasn't worth it to try and skimp on these. Having 13 taps makes it more convenient. Now there is a water tap for about every 5 houses. The next thing that I did was to reconsider the population of Kamiendor. Before, I said there were 400 people. Now, my current guess is 600 people. That comes out to about 8.5 people per house, which sounds about right. With these two changes I had to go back and do my design all over again. I might bring it into the Ministry and have them check it tomorrow. I think that I have the basics finished, but all of the fine details will have to wait until later.

Saturday, April 2, 1977, 2:00 pm, Day 431

Well, I must be back to normal now. It has been 11 days since I last wrote in this journal.

It took me longer to fix up the design than I figured. I redid both Kamiendor and Saiama, and then redid them again. Finally on Tuesday the 29th, I took them both in to the Ministry. They both got accepted. I had my maps with me, all ready for copying, and so I got those run off, and they are now official. I still have to work out how much I will need of each thing but I can do that upcountry.

I left Freetown on wednesday and stopped off to see my friendly, neighborhood Peace Corps girls in the Kono area on the way up. I spent that night in Yengema, a few miles from Sefadu. Instead of moving out the next day, I decided to stay for one extra day. I met two of them, Chris and Kathy, for the first time, and so spending the extra day, I got to know them alot better. Nancy, I had met four times before, so our relationship just continued. All three of them are education volunteers who have extended for their third year.

I also met the two British volunteers who are also in the area. They are Brian and John and I think they are both about done with their second year. They are in education also.

On Friday I finally made it back to Kamiendor. On the way I stopped off in the third village on my list, Jagbwema, to see how things were going. I had left Foday Moiba, my coworker, by himself for these last three weeks to give him a chance to do some surveying on his own. I guess he was doing fine until just a few days ago. It seems that the bolt that holds the transit onto its stand has broken again. It broke before in Saiama but we had it welded and it was ok until now. I found a note saying that he is in Koidu to get it fixed, and that he will be back on Sunday. I decided then to head on up to Kamiendor to wait out those few days.

When I arrived, I found that Kagbune, my cook, was still hanging around, waiting to see if I wanted to take him back on. I almost did, but I didn't because he was too much trouble before and it would be too much to expect things to change now. Instead, I thought I would try to find people that belonged in the village, to work for me. This way they would have something else to keep them busy when I wasn't here. I figured I could get one of my ladies to cook dinner for me each night and I would just pay her a flat rate and she would buy the food. Then I would find someone else to wash my clothes and then someone else to bring water for me. I think that things seem to be working out fine. I've had my clothes washed today and I think that my favorite lady is willing to cook for me.

Sunday, April 3, 1977, 12:00 noon, Day 432

Things are shaping up now since I got rid of my cook. Yesterday, the ladies that live in my house gave me rice two times, so that when it came time to eat the rice that I arranged with my favorite lady, my belly was full. I was also given alot of bananas.

Today I started out the morning by making pancakes. Afterwards, when I opened my door to let the world come in, I was met by one of the ladies of the house, who handed me a pot of rice. I was full at the moment so I saved it and am eating it now while I write. Just a few minutes ago, the town chief and the chiefdom speaker stopped by my room. They were concerned about my not having my cook any longer. I told them that some of the ladies were now cooking for me. They offered to bring me a supply of rice and plassas (topping). I guess cutting out the middle man did some good.


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