Some kind of blue bird-- I'm still researching, sitting on a mango (here called a plum) tree.

A breezy day down at the Thinker's Village beach.

A Week of Homework

This was a busy week, but mostly spent at home. Both Renita and I have full schedules-- Renita with LEAD, homeschooling and the upcoming LEAD/Madison Square Church visit, and me with developing psychosocial training, working on this mental health task force, trying to forge links between Mother Patern College and US schools, and just last week, the college asked me to teach a class called "Conflict, Trauma and Peacebuiling." Great sounding course, but the curriculum is gone. So I get to invent my own peacebuilding class. Its a lot of work, but I love the topic. Here is what our week looked like in a few pictures.

The day begins with a lil' breakie. Some toast and eggs. Here, I'm checking so as not to burn da bread.

Homeschooling. Renita explaining the day's tasks.

Renita at midday, grading papers for business people in the LEAD class. Some of her students need a lot of help.

I'm on a roll. I'm developing the course outline and schedule for the class I'm teaching starting Feb 27. This was a good day.

Early afternoon. School's out and Noah shares his "playtoys" with Walker in red, Enoch in green stripe, and Obadiah in sorta white.

Some of her work done, Renita relaxes in the hammock. Reading Maya Angelou's "All God's Children Need Traveling Shoes."

Mid afternoon, and Hannah shakes a little boote' with Odelle, Victoria 2, and Rachel. This is a couple houses away, as Hannah continues to explore the neighborhood.

Late afternoon football action. Renita decides to face her mortality and explore what her lifestyle is doing to her muscle tone. Me, I take pictures.

Lionel and Noah, on the right, wrestling, get slammed by Hannah and Andrew, on left who are playing soccer. Nikki drools from a distance, preparing to seriously lick somebody.

How we prepare for the evening-- hauling the "VV9500" generator from house to shed. At ten pm, we bring it back in to the house. Its good exercise and a moment of sharing for Renita and me. Sniff.

A parting shot of my two favorite ladies.

What Do You Do When the Well Runs Dry, Honey?

Well, if you are in Liberia, usually not much you can do, except find another well. The well that sits between our property line and Deacon Reeves’ is an open, uncovered well that serves probably twelve families. However, every year during the dry season, the well begins to produce dirty water as the water table drops, and sometimes families have to wait all day for the well to be used again. Thanks to a generous and caring family in Grand Rapids, the well is being deepened to a point where it no longer will run out of water. The process is interesting. The well is essentially a series of culverts cemented together and dug into the ground. However, to deepen a well, you can’t put culverts on the bottom of the well, so you start from the top. A worker goes into the well and digs at the base of the bottom culvert until the whole well begins to sink. As it sinks, new culverts are added on top, the top culvert is given a “cap”—not a cover-- and the well is back in business.

Now, it is still an open well, and tests have shown that while the ground water is good, the water gets contaminated by each bucket that gets dropped by line into it. The Reeds are fortunate in that we have a filter that all our water goes through. Our neighbors are not so fortunate, and while they are adjusted to the water most of the time, there still is a risk of contracting water born diseases. Hopefully, someday we can cover the well and put a pump on it. But at least now, our neighbors will have water, all the way through the dry season. Here is a look-see at the process--

This is what the well looked like before the work began. Hannah and I doing the daily chore of drawing and hauling 30-50 gallons of water.

Here is Mr. Sanfo and Son preparing the well for sinking. The cover has been removed and the collar busted up around the base.

Sanfo Jr. in the well digging out the sand underneath so the culvert assembly will begin to sink.

Pappa Sanfo holds the line over Jr. While Noah and Renita learn the trade.

The well has sunk, so...

... the first of two is cemented on top of the well. Meanwhile, the structure continues to sink.

See? First culvert lower, second in the wings...

...and put into place. Soon we will be back drawing water again. A mixed blessing if ever there was one.

By the way, we got a special request for a garden update. Here are the tomatoes...

Also, one of the pineapples. Now you've seen the garden, ma.

On the blocks. Its where the cool kids hang out now. I forget the standing kid's name. Andrew is sitting, then Hannah of course, Noah and Majua.

Here are a couple shots of some changes at one of the schools some of you support. This one is a partner with Millbrook Christian in Grand Rapids. Here the kids work on a dirt floor without desks.

And here is the same room, same kids, with a concrete floor and desks. Thanks Millbrook! And example of what Liberians and Americans are accomplishing as we work together.

On to the LEAD workshop Renita is headingl. Here is a familiar face to some of you-- Pastor Sam Reeves of Providence Baptist Church offers his perspective at the workshop. Sam is a LEAD board member.

James Hilary, LEAD program coordinator, talks with business leaders about making their businesses grow.

A few shots of the training retreat I attended in Gbarnga. Here we are on our way. Noah got a little motion sick after four hours of bumpy travel.

We arrive at the retreat center in Gbarnga. Noah waves out our bedroom window.

A water tower. Noah and I are thinking the same thing-- running water, and flushing toilets. Ahhhh!

The retreat participants. I get to hang out with heroes rebuilding their war weary people.

And finally, this shot of the area surrounding our retreat center in Gbarnga. Early morning, looks like we should see a dinosaur any minute.

What Are We Doing Here, part 2

This week finds a couple of new activities on our work list. Renita has started the LEAD series of twelve weekly workshops for the twenty-five business owners that were accepted into this round of the program. Businesses involved range from bread making to steel work, from construction to solar lights, from hair salons to tailoring, from soap making to wood carving. Potential new jobs as a result of loans from LEAD will be around 130. She took some shots of some of her co-presenters—hopefully next week she will get someone to take a pic of her in action in front of the class.

I and Noah are off to the interior, Gbarnga in Bong County, to be exact. I will be attending a three day workshop starting Monday the 23rd with some of Mother Patern College’s partners, and I thought Noah might like to tag along and see some of the country. He’ll have school work and I’ll bring my laptop to keep him occupied on the compound where we are staying while I’m workshopping a few yards away. The purpose of the workshop will be to more clearly define the psychosocial training needs of our partners so that I and others can design programs to meet each organization’s respective needs. I will have images of the landscape and our time upon my return.

ReedNews Update

Well, Julie DeGraw is back in the USA, and we are settling back to normal. Here are some news tidbits:

Item: On Monday the 16th, Liberia will inaugurate its president, Madam Ellen Johnson Sirleaf. By now most of you know what an historic event this is for Africa and the world. It’s a big deal, with dignitaries from around the world coming. George Bush’s better half and the Secretary of State will be here, so the security is already tightening. And the entire country is sprucing up. Every where you go, roads are being patched, brush is being cut, junk and trash is being picked up, and buildings are getting a new coat of whitewash. The capitol building looks great. I’ll get you a picture.

Item: The beach orphanage is no more. On Saturday, the children were transferred to a home run by a registered nurse, Esther Wleh. Interestingly, only five children were transferred—the other eight found their way back to their families. This was what we wondered: how many of the beach children actually had family who should be taking care of them, and when mild pressure was applied, the truth came to light. So eight children went back to their families, and the remaining five—truly abandoned or orphaned—joined the Wleh orphanage. Thanks to some of you, a new room was added to the building, a well head repaired, six new bunk beds, mosquito netting for all 38 children, uniforms for school, and there is still enough to provide a few bags of rice each month for a year.

Item: All the recent rogue activity has brought with it increased community activism. Leaders around us have been meeting to discuss ways to join together and form a night-time watch. Even though we have not been the only ones targeted, we sense some of this care is directed toward us. The community folks have been very kind in their words about us and seem to fear that if the rogue activity does not stop, we might leave. This will not happen, but we appreciate them looking out for us.

Item: Despite our desire to not spend time and resources on security that our neighbors can not have, we have come to see the need for what our neighbors are urging us to do. So the wall is now about nine feet high, with glass shards cemented in the top. There are neighbors patrolling our area at night, we have solar powered flood lights around half the house, and today some guys are covering our windows with chicken wire to keep hands from cutting our mosquito screens and reaching in through the bars. Is this too much? Not here, where these kinds of measures are in use in any home that can afford it.

Item: Noting the absolute worthlessness of Nikki as a guard dog, we have added yet another pooch to the family—Pinky. However, this one is a barker and in the most recent rogue event, she woke us all up and warned us of the intruders. We’ve had her about three weeks now, and we think we have a winner.

Item: Renita is busy these days visiting many businesses for LEAD. She is getting to know folks and word is spreading about this organization empowering Liberian businesses to grow. Of course, the Dynamo is also teaching the kids. This semester, in addition to the regular courses, she’s throwing Spanish and typing at the lil’ nubbins.

Item: Plans are underway with the staff of Mother Patern College to have something they’ve never had before—A Bachelor of Social Work program (counseling emphasis). Joseph, the MSW at the school, and I are hammering out the curriculum and will teach many of the courses. But we could use a hand and are thinking of asking a US college with a BSW program to lend us some expertise. Any thoughts from you as to who we might consider?

That’s the news. Here are the images.

The transfer of the five remaining kids has begun. Unpacking at the new facility. Clean water, better food, access to medicine, an RN manager, supervison and night security, and much more support. Not the conditions where most of us grew up in, for sure, but at least no longer life/health threatening.

The new children are welcomed with a song by the current residents.

The five children up front-- the old manager on the left, with Esther in the red patterned dress on the left. A new home and a new level of peace.

The men working on upgrading the security of the our windows. Note the higher wall in the background.

John Loboe and his wife, owners of JAT Soap Making Center. One of the businesses Lead is serving.

Introducing Pinky, our dogs that actually barks. Here she is giving Nikki-- the worthless licker-- what for.

That's the news. Good night!

A friend stops by from Michigan

Tis been a busy week for us, thus blog work is more infrequent. That’s a good indicator of how preoccupied we are: more blogs, more time on our hands to write them. Fewer blogs, we are up to stuff.

Anyway, our dear friend Julie DeGraw visited us from Ann Arbor where she is working on her PhD from the University of Michigan. (we don’t hold that against her.) She joined us just at the right time. Our spirits were a bit on the wane due to recent rogue behavior, and Julie is the kind of person who is always upbeat and optimistic, but completely authentic. Don’t the fake upbeat people drive you nuts?

So, Julie was here to help us celebrate 2006, organize a Birthday Party for Jesus with about thirty neighborhood kids, and deliver some support funds from some of you. The moneys are going to the orphanage we selected to take in the kids from the beach orphanage.

We’ve been having a lot of fun, despite the work involved in upgrading the orphanage and putting on the party. Julie is still here, so things are a bit hectic. The kids are having a riot—Noah just got back from an overnighter with friend on the Mercy Ship docked at the port. Hannah is enjoying teasing the several Liberian boys who seem to have a crush on her. Our wall is being raised a few feet, the crazy season is over, and we are getting ready to get back to work.

Julie Degraw at the new orphanage with the well some of you helped repair. See? Clean water!

A day at the beach. I'm telling Julie how much I hate it when Renita takes shots of me at profile. I look fat enough straight on, but at profile I look like Alfred Hitchcock.

The Christmas party begins-- a great day of fun prizes and clothes for the kids-- supplied by some of you!

Tug o' war with Renita in the middle.

I try my hand at face painting...

... but Hannah is the real artist in the family.

Sack Races!

Noah supervising bobbing for apples.

Acting out the Christmas story: here Mary (pink towel) is visited by Gabriel (White towel)

Oh, and by the way-- HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!