Niger- Day 3

When we arrived here the refrigerator was broken, as we mentioned before.  The unusual thing is that most people from Niger do not own refrigerators because they are very expensive to buy and run.  Most people just leave their food outside.  Today's temperature is the sun at 4:30 p.m. is 113 degrees so just imagine what that does to your food.

I don't know if I told you, but I was asked to bring 2- 2 gallon igloo water containers because in Niger, anything that keeps things cold, including ice, is very very expensive.  The water containers that I purchased were $6.99- here, they cost over $40 a piece.  Ice Chests or large coolers are well over $80 for the small ones.  The good news is that the fridge go fixed today, so we have cool water again.  They still need to purchase a new one, but now we are not in a crisis to purchase and they can try to find a used one.

With the temperature well over 100 degrees, we did not spend the afternoon digging.  We will start again after 5 p.m. and work until 8 p.m. or until dinner.  We did work on the rebar that needs to be used to form the walls, but mostly we took many breaks and naps.  

The food continues to be challenging for Kay and I.  Today we had mutten stew and I think that is what will be served for dinner.  There is some fresh fruit and the much cherished granola bars I brought from home.  Yesterday we also lost our water, but thank goodness it came back on just before bedtime, so we could shower (only cold water- although we heat up some in containers outside most days- so you can have a lukewarm shower).

This place continues to amaze us and life here is so very hard for those who call Niger home.  We are not even here during that hot season- that begins in March/April- I can't even imagine what that would be like.

I thank God that Kay came with me on the trip, because I can't even begin to describe it to you.  You just can't put it into words.  The Christian community here is so small, maybe only 10% of the population, but they are trying so hard to bring the Good News to their broken world.

Kay has spent two entertaining the Beebouts 3-year-old daughter while they attended Hausa lessons.  Kay is a little sunburned and bruised from this mornings work.  That is what she gest for being blonde- who says blondes have more fun?

We are having a difficulty logging on to post info to the blog so Kelsey is posting our emails to her.  I don't think that we will be able to upload pictures, so you will have to wait until we get home.

Sue and Kay