Rain and Roosters

I woke up today by the sound of rain and roosters. It is rainy season in Africa and it rains a few hours each day. It is kinda refreshing...probably keeps from getting everything too hot. However, it is also very muddy. I have appreciated the new hiking boots my sister-in-law gave me. The chicken coop is right behind my building...so naturally the rooster gets to wake me up. I was warned so I had ear plugs handy...they didn't drown out all the noise but it helped all the same.

The place is beautiful. The ICDI station has two sections. One section is the well drilling, offices, and garage area and the other side has all the houses (5 in total) and a swimming pool. Yep, you are reading that right a swimming pool. For those of you who know me well, swimming is very thearpeutic and I love it. Two of the houses are larger french colonal houses with wrap around porches, flowers beautifully arranged. I would relate this to being like a rather nice camping trip in nice cabins. It is simple and yet beautiful.

The electiricity is run by generaters so we only have power from 7:30 am to 9:30 pm and even then the power may be turned off at times....there is wireless satelite internet. It is sort of fun to be in a place that feels very primitive but has great tools to still get the job done.

I enjoyed today as I got an opportunity to sit with Jim (my boss) and talk through a few ideas and direction items. It always inspires me to have a person to talk through ideas and due to Jim's travels we have not had much time to talk.

Tomorrow is church. I get to sit in a french church and not understand a thing. Honestly, I know I shouldn't think like this but I really don't look forward to it. I like meeting people but I can not say anything more than hello and how are you in Sango. I have found that most of my french lessons are not that helpful as most people speak sango. Of well...par for the course. So, the service will be in another langugage and I struggle through sitting still at English speaking churches. Hopefully, I will be surprised.

On Monday, I start working with Alphonse on enhancing the accounting in Berberati. It should be fun and I will be glad to develop a relationship around a mutually desired task. He seems very eager to do his best and is glad to be able to learn new techniques to allow him to do his best.