Like a stick into a beehive

Greetings dear followers of the Stichting Samenscholen project of 2012!
This week that supposedly would become a calm week of waiting turned out to hold quite some unexpected surprises. I’m Henrik by the way, one of the Swedish carpenters.

Monday passed, as advertised, rather calmly for the construction crew. In the morning some went out to meet the guy responsible for measuring our piece of land. I’m not sure how many times Lena has met with him, but the process has been going on for quite some time. As usual we were not able to nail down the exact size of the lot by the information he gave us. He did bring some very interesting news though. Apparently the road would be changed to connect on the north side of the lot instead of going around to the south. This change was to be confirmed the following day, when we also would get the final information for the lot.

Tuesday morning the guy came to the building site to confirm both the current location of the lot, which was good, and the changed plan of where the road would connect. This meant that the current plan was far from optimal with the entrance facing the wrong direction. However we had prepared for this the previous night and knew that it meant we would have to relocate the three buildings. As we were about to start with offsetting the first construction Lena received the call.

Pim who would arrive later that evening was on the other side of the line to bring us the great news of our truck finally being able to move again. It would arrive at the construction site in a little over two hours. For the aliens looking down upon us from above it must have looked like someone stuck a stick into a beehive. In two hours the site went from a stalemate to bustling commotion. All hands on deck, our volunteers we’re called in, the local constructors as well. Strings were pulled to get a hockey team worth of carriers with the wooden carts onsite. The truck arrived and a day of very hard work began. In the end the operation was successful, we had our material!

The offsetting was remade, 9 meters further north, before lunch on Wednesday so that we could start digging the holes for the foundation when the volunteers arrived at one a clock. Three out of the 15 promised volunteers showed. In contradiction to the guidelines of the foundation we decided to work the rest of the day even if the local foundation had not provided us with the agreed number of volunteers, we were just too eager to get going.

Thursday came and went without so much as one shovel of dirt being taken out of the ground. Again the local foundation failed to provide a sufficient workforce. After a few hours of waiting at the construction site we decided to blow the whistle and send the people that had showed up home again for a rerun on Friday. Even if the physical work was at halt we got a lot of planning done during the rest of the day. Our truck from Managua had arrived with the materials earlier this week but there was still the issue of concrete being virtually unobtainable in Puerto, this also due to the blockade.

Friday came, and there was light. A handsome group of local volunteers appeared no more than half an hour late. Again the site was bustling with activity, All 21 holes for the foundation-feet were finished. And the rebar cutting, bending and assembling got well underway. The mood was already high when we received confirmation of concrete being delivered to us by the end of the day. By six a clock we finished moving the concrete into the bodega. The warm wind rushed by our tired but happy faces as we rode home through the city on the back of our truck.

So far I think all of us have a good time here in Nica. During the evenings the large stone rooms echo with laughter and music. During the days it’s busy with the therapists activities and the other researchers. I’m sure you will hear more about them next week.

Finally I like to say, on the behalf of all of us, goodbye Marije! And welcome Pim!

Henrik