AUGUST 4, 2013 UPDATE

Sunday morning and time for mass (8 am), but I’ll skip this one since I’m driving Fr Jim to the next one at 11 am. I’ll attend that one with Jim and our new seminarian. Fr Jim still falls asleep at the wheel if it’s more than a 20 minute drive; esp. late in the morning. His new breathing machine has been working well, but he still gets tired in late morning and takes a nap if possible; sometimes one in the afternoon after lunch.

             We bought all the new pipe (7 rolls) and installed one section at the bottom of the hill. Now all is working well, Thank God. We will probably never get compensation for the thin wall pipe or the labour. We use the mission pump several days a week to fill the school tank, as the #3 generator is still not repaired. We cannot find the part needed. Even if we could repair it, the water source is drying up and can only pump a few minutes. It appears to be due to the dam break last year near there. Lameck the MP (member of parliment), brought in a very large bulldozer last week to make dam repairs but it was still too wet to get where it needed to. We had two nice rains (2” and 1”) about a week apart so this may be the start of a new rainy season, but it seems too soon.

             Fr Jim and his vicar attended the 3^rd and final ordination of new priests this week. In addition to announcing the new priest at Kowak the bishop made a point to say the Fr Matungwa would continue living at Kowak.  Jim asked Fr Val about that later and Val said that was “just words” and he still plans to move when his new house is ready in late Sept.  Jim does not expect that and wants me to move soon to Alex’s house to make room for the new priest before the 18th. I hate to make two moves but looks like I need to and see what develops.

            I met a former Form IV student, Milka, this week that I had sponsored during her last two years here. She asked for money to attend an A level school (Jr College) in Tabora. I agreed, so will send that via mpesa this week. Her mother died 2 years ago and her new mother refused to finance her. At least it is a gov ernemt school, so $300 for a year including pocket money is cheap, she says.

             The Adoration Sisters are all well now, but that varies from week to week. Two of the new ones have had their first cases of malaria. I worked with Bhoke and Sr Theresa in the duka this week to get it better organized, so we can inventory more easily. That will be a monthly thing along with the cash count at the school and parish. Bhoke had some good ideas and I think we will be impressed. I am getting the school store well stocked now and sales are increasing. That may not last as the student pocket money is depleted. The new head mistress, Sr Tessena, came to inspect and was shocked at the condition of the small denomiation notes. She wants me to take them back to the bank and get new ones. I laughed and said we are lucky to have small notes in any condition. These are normal for Tanzania. I thought she had been here for several years. She must have lead a sheltered life. She has asked all the employees to return all the school keys to my office or hers at the end of each day and pick them up the next morning. I just installed a key panel on the back of the bursar office door with names of each employee to allow us to get the keys more easily and see which are missing.

            No new construction projects now except for a large, rock lined drainage ditch in front of the school mango tree near my office. It will be done Monday. The convent is about a month away from completion, so the 4 new sisters are all living in the head mistress’s house. We will open the new children’s ward after the new chairs, desks and kabati are built. Fr Jim is using a craftsman in Utegi to do that.  Maybe it will be ready in two weeks. We had the hospital four wheel drive Toyota rebuilt this week and expect it back tomorrow. Then we will have the hospital pickup motor rebuilt. 

            Mass is almost over so I better get ready to hit the road. I’ll be going to Musoma tomorrow for more cash, to pay bills and get more school store supplies. I also need to go into the CTC today or tomorrow and finish entering 6 new patients as I did not get to do that on Friday. 

Tom in Kowak