The
Canadians go on Friday morning and by the afternoon I am already running into
problems and concerned about the ramp joining the two physio rooms. Two
doorways confluence at this point, the outside one and the one between the two
rooms, so the top needs to be flat for a wheelchair to negotiate between the
two doors. I discuss it with Maboleka and leave him to build the outside ramp,
the top section and the run off into the dormitory.
I return
later in the afternoon to find the run off is way too steep and Mab has already
run out of cement. Mab extends the shuttering for the inside ramp and I go to
find him more cement. I see if a driver can take me to London in the Buckie, only
to find the Buckie is dead and there is no transport available. I remember the
Chinese shop on the hill sells cement so ask Mahali if he can get some guys to
come up the hill with me to carry back three bags of cement. Mahali thinks that
is possible and that there are even a couple of wheelbarrows to assist us.
Mahali says “Ntate who hits himself” will help. This
reference follows a conversation we had last week when I was very alarmed to
see the man who lives in the hut opposite mine, viciously beating himself up.
He clearly has a mental illness, although normally he is very passive and just
sits looking into the distance talking
to himself. Mahali assures me he is harmless and the right man for the job. He
also ropes another man in “Ntate who grinds the porridge” and our procession
makes it way up the hill to the Chinese shop.
We stop off
at the huts, so I can get money and Ntate “who hits himself” can change. He usually
wears a long black coat and gumboots, but today is curiously dressed in a tweed
waistcoat. He changes into his black coat and we make it to the top of the hill.
The Chinese lady is very happy to see me again, after I was here in March and brought
half her stock of chillies. I assure her I am not after chillies this time, but
three bags of cement and three bottles
of pop for the guys.
We get back
down the hill, drop off the cement and I give the guys some Maloti. “Ntate who
wears the long black coat” (as I call him in his regular attire), likes to
collect coins even though he doesn’t spend them. Mahali tells me he has a store
of hundreds.
I consult
again with Mab that he is happy that he can continue the ramp. Unfortunately,
he has now run out of rough sand and fine sand. The thought of going to London,
three miles away, on foot with the wheel barrows to source supplies does not
appeal. Mahali says maybe tomorrow the Buckie will work or maybe we can ask
Mamello if we can take from the piles of sand being used to build another
hut outside where I’m living.
In the
morning I go down to Phelisanong and
neither Mahali, Mamello or the Buckie are around. I ask Mamajoan, who is in
charge, whether she can call Mamello to ask if we can take from the piles of
sand being to build the hut. The answer is “Yes” which only leaves me the
problem of how to get it down the hill. The only person around is Ntate who
wears the long black coat, who is happily washing his gumboots, his favourite
activity.
Feeling I
had bonded with him, a little, after yesterday’s cement expedition, and having
now found out that his real name is Thabang, I try to mime to him what I want
him to do. There is a little confusion when he brings a steel bar out of his
hut, with two giant weights of cement attached. I shake my head and go in his
hut, which he shares with four other guys and a wheelbarrow and extract the
wheelbarrow and a spade. I show him what I want him to do, then hand him the
spade to continue.
He follows
me down with the full barrow to the physio building. We repeat three times with
the rough sand and then make then transition to fine sand. The last run he does
by himself, then I follow him up again and point to the broken wooden bed lying
outside my hut. The wood is good enough quality to make rails for the ramp and
we pick it up together and take it to Mab to recycle.
By now I
have been up and down the track eight times. It’s early morning and already must
be 30 degrees and I am sweating cobs. Thabang has done the same number of
journeys, pushing his loaded barrow and wearing his long black coat, a woollen
jumper and a shirt. He is also sweating profusely but does not remove his coat.
I am hoping
we have now got supplies sorted, but Mab shakes his head. There is no water to
make the cement. I go to ask Mamajoan it she can get the village higher up to
turn on the water. They do occasionally, but it has become much less frequent in
the current drought and you never know when its going to happen. She rings but
its in the hands of the Gods and I ask Mab to explain to Thabang to go down to
the stream with his barrow, water containers and scope, to bring back
water.
He does so
and for the moment we are sorted. I go back up to the huts with Thabang and
give him some coins to add to his collection. I go into my hut to get some
shade and a few minutes later I can hear bangs and shouting and know that Thabang
is beating himself up again. Eventually he stops and returns to quietly washing
his gumboots.
After lunch
I hear a Buckie approaching, it is Mr Chabalala, the builder of the first
physio room. He leaps out and tells me off for not telling him I am here. I
side step the issue and tell him I like the path he has built. We josh each
other for a bit before he disappears in a cloud of dust to do more deals.
Later I hear
the joyful sound of running water and realise the outside tap has come back on.
I and the lads in the other hut, run out and fill every available container and
count our blessings. I drink a litre and feel I have enough energy to get up
the hill to buy Mab and the guys some pop and see how they are getting on.
I find that
although Mab is building the mother of all ramps it is still way too steep, and
that he has run out of sand again and is nearly out of cement. I can’t see any
way around it but to get Mab to further extend the ramp into the room and for
me to try and track down further supplies for him .
Happily,
Mamello is onsite and I get a lift with her and the driver takes me to London
where the cement is a 20 percent cheaper than the Chinese at the top of the
hill. Its tea time and in the shop the Chinese are all sitting at their tills
eating noodles and are still open for business. We get the cement and drop it
back with Mab. The old Buckie is available to collect the sand but
unfortunately the “Fat Ntate” who has the keys is not. Thabang is not around to
push the wheelbarrow but the lovely student Thapello, who is one of the lads
who lives in the house with Thabang, says he will sort it.
It is now dark,
and I hear him going up and down the hill with the wheelbarrow six times which
takes about an hour and half. He hasn’t eaten, and I make him some food while
we talk. He is nearly 18, a year younger than my son, but his story is very
different. He is at Phelisanong as he is an orphan. He walks 12 km a day to go
to school, loves acting and dreams of becoming a TV presenter.
He lives
with four other boys and Thabang in a hut, about the same size as mine. They all
sleep on the floor and look after Thabang when he has his nightmares and try to
calm him to stop him harming himself. He says he is glad Thabang lives with
them, as the care mothers shout at him and don’t understand his mental illness.
He tells me all these things in beautifully spoken English with no self-pity. I
am humbled by his positive outlook and his care of Thabang.
He leaves,
and I fall asleep, waking a couple of hours later with the heat of the night
and anxiety about the wheelchair ramp, how much space it is taking and how safe
it will be for the children to negotiate. In the morning I go back to review it
and test with Palesa in a wheelchair. Its no good, despite Mab’s extension it’s
still way too steep and unsafe.
I must stop
guessing and take measurements. We have already wasted two days, and goodness
knows how much concrete, on something that doesn’t work and is taking a lot of
space up in the room. The drop off is 18 inches and UK regs for a ramp for
self-propelling wheelchair are one inch of rise for every 12 inches of length.
This would make the ideal ramp 18 feet long and nearly the length of the room.
Its already
7 feet long, five foot six inches wide and too difficult to smash the concrete
to try and make an L shape. Anyway, that would only reduce the bed space
further. I stand in the middle of the room stressing, while trying to entertain
Palesa, sort out crutches for the Albino gentleman who is hobbling around, fend
off Teko who wants petrol money, talk to Mab with the power saw going and
What’s App Steve in Germany to bounce some ideas off him.
The ideal
solution would be to raise the entire floor, but that’s a huge amount of work
and not going to happen. I need to work with what I have. I decide to abandon
the concrete ramp and make a wooden ramp. Wood should be much quicker and
easier to work with and allow carpet to be nailed to it. This will hopefully
give enough friction to make the steeper than ideal incline safe. I pray that
transport is available to go to Leribe and get the necessary materials and this
compromise solution will work.
The good
news on Monday morning is that transport is available. The bad news is its full
of other people doing lots of other errands and therefore its going to be an
epic with lots of waiting around in the suffocating heat. Mab has given me a
list of materials, but I still must make decisions on how to make the ramp safe.
I get the things that Mab needs but they don’t fit into the Buckie, so I pay for
transport twice on top of everything else.
I got back
and forward between shops, trying to find carpet and something to hold it down.
No one understands what I need and try to sell me everything from fluffy rugs
to kitchen Linoleum. I go back to Cash and Build to consider painting options
and even roofing rubber. I think the assistant senses I am about to have a
breakdown in the middle of the shop and is extremely kind and tries to help me as
best he can. I must get the decision right if the children are to access the
building safely, but everything is a compromise and the pressure is huge.
In the end I
go for textured paint and pray I’ve made the right choice. The assistant brings
me a bucket of water, so I can use the toilet, and then a plastic chair , so I
can sit down, before I fall down. Teko eventually picks me up and after driving
around Leribe for another hour, picking up people and dropping them off, we
finally leave. There is now less than two and a half days left to make the
dormitory accessible and habitable and I want to get back to see if the ramp
will work.
We stop on
route again, this time to get milk, but everyone has apparently gone to lunch,
even though it is 2.15 pm. I am drumming on the dash board with steam coming
out of my ears. Teko wisely decides to abandon the milk idea and we finally get
back to Phelisanong. Happily, the materials have been delivered and Mab builds
a quick mock up to see what the incline is like. After yesterdays demo with
Palesa he could see how big the problem was and is completely onside.
The angle
looks much better, even though it is steeper than it should be I think it will
work. It will dominate the room, but I think some of the children can use it as
part of their physiotherapy, for balancing and assisted walking. We will just
have to make it a feature so everyone will want one in their homes!
I relax a
bit and get little Josh and Palesa in to do a bit of physio amidst the concrete
and dust. They are two of the 45 children left here who have no relatives or
homes to go to when the others go home for holidays. It’s the first time I’ve
had the time to do any physio in the last three days and feels quite calming, that
is until Josh does a smelly poo in his nappy and big fat tears roll down his
cheeks. He waddles off pushing a small frame in front of him. I’ve said he will
walk independently next year. No pressure then Josh!
Feeling the
ramp crisis is well on its way to being sorted Tuesday stats well. Mab quickly helps
me get the wall bars and parallel bars fixed and its amazing to see them
finally in situ having raised the money for them and sent them on their way,
via Ireland over a year ago.
The ramp
still needs some wood and the wall needs painting where the corridor was knocked through. I
leave Mab cracking on with shelves and the toilet wall while I go to London to
get the bits. It’s starting to look like we can get the beds into the extension
block before me and Mab are out of here on Thursday. I can’t find anything I
need in London and by the time I get back to Phelisanong the mother of all
storms has hit. I am stuck in the hut that used to be the old physio room for
fear I will get hit by lighting or washed away if I try get across to the new
physio room.
A house
mother is madly mopping the flood that’s coming in under the door while the
children stuff a blanket in the gap to try and stem the tide. When there is
slight lull I make a dash for the physio room. It’s dark, even though its only
3 pm Mab and the guys are wearing head torches as the electricity is down. The
roof of the extension room is leaking, and part of the ceiling is down where
the wind has lifted it. Holy crap!
With power
off the guys can’t do anymore work and anyway the priority has now changed to
fixing the roof, which can’t be done while there is a gale and hail stones the
size of marbles coming down. Sitting here in the dark writing this, wondering
how the hell we can sort this mess out, especially with the weather against us.
After all this time with drought the rain is coming down in buckets and even
super Mab has been stopped in his tracks.
In the
morning there is calm, and the sun comes out. There is damage everywhere where
the gale lifted off tin roofs and rivers of water swept down the hill. I go to
the physio room to find it still standing but the outside cladding has blown in
various parts where the water has caused the wood to expand and pop out.
Mab goes up
on the roof with a giant gun of filler, to sort the gaps under the top ridge
and bang wood around gaps in the side. He doesn’t have enough filler to do the
job, so I go to beg the admin staff to get some when they go to Leribe on
Thursday. Both gentlemen are from Zimbabwe and have not been at Phelisanong
long enough to know how violent the storms can be here. They were caught out in
it yesterday, trying to get home and found themselves blown off their feet and
attacked by the giant hail stones.
In their traumatised
state I get them to agree to buy the filler that Mab needs to finish fixing the roof.
Mab has agreed to stay to the weekend to try and sort the extra work that now
needs to be done to make the extension habitable. I return to the physio room to meet Mr Chabalala to get a
quote for the physio room which has no ceiling, is freezing in winter and mind
numbingly noisy when it hails. I meet Mr
Chalabala wife, who is waiting in the Buckie, and tell her she’s a lucky lady making
everyone laugh. They drop me in London, so I can get some beer for the guys and
money to pay them till the end of the week.
When I get
back to Phelisanong everyone has gone for food. The ramp is finished, bar a set
of rails down one side. I’m glad I brought the bed down to use the wood,
because it’s the only wood smooth enough to use for rails and we don’t have a
sander to improve things. Unfortunately, the guys carpentry skills are very
limited, the joins are crude and there are nails sticking out, not great for
kids who are crawling.
I bash nails
in where I can and prime the wood. Hopefully with another two layers of
textured paint it will be safe enough to use. Manyanye is picking me up tomorrow
to take me back to Maseru and I have to leave Mab to make good. By the time I’ve finished its
dark and I realise I am utterly exhausted by the stress of the last week. The
moon has risen as I slowly make my way up the track to my hut. The mountains
are black silhouettes in the night sky and it’s beautiful and peaceful. I reflect
on the words of the lady who found me stressing out about the building
problems a few days ago. “Don’t worry Mme Jan, it will work out fine” and I
guess it will in an African kind of way 😊
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