Harvest Time and Too Many Calories

August 3^rd-5^th: Monday-Wednesday

Monday we started harvesting sorghum. After Craig and I laid out the hibiscus Thomas and I went and put are in the tractor tire and checked the oil and water and made sure it was ready to go. Then around 8:30 we drove out to the sorghum fields. There were between 50 and 70 people waiting outside the front gates hoping to get hired. Well then Craig hopped down and was immediantly mobbed by all these people trying to get a job. Craig hired about 20 people plus all the mazungus and we started harvesting.

Harvesting sorghum is really easy. Sorghum is a member of the same family as wheat and it looks pretty similar. The head is covered in little round seeds that start of green and turn a red, burgundy when they ripen. In order to harvest it you have to go through and cut off the head. Generally there are some ladies who follow everyone cutting and carry the bags and collect the heads. Then they transfer the sorghum to the tractor which follows us through the fields. It’s a blast from the past. Its actually way more enjoyable than my last job in America so no complaints.

Monday and Tuesday after work we played football, blacks vs whites. There is still division in this country Mark told me. Albert, JB, Mark, Lokwii, and Moses played against Peter, Mark, Mark, Johan, and I. it was really fun and passionate. We tied both days and only quit because we mazungus needed to go to dinner. Actually we white guys did ok. All these Africans are better players one on one but I think the lack the team unity and organization needed. To many chiefs and not enough Indians sort of deal.

The group of visitors left Wednesday morning. James and I came in from cutting sorghum to say goodbye. Jim and Johan are taking them down to the airport so I am going to be all alone here. Mark moved out. He is going to go stay I the now unoccupied banda so he can sleep on a bottom bunk. That afternoon Craig and I went down to the clinic to finish the bandas. We put the last coat of paint on and finished everything. Craig says that these new staff bandas have been a two year project and now they’re done. I think that’s pretty cool even though I was only here for the last two months. I feel very accomplished. That evening James and I bought a kilo of potatoes from Kris and decided to make potato chips. We cleaned them and then cut them as thin as we could. Then we put some oil in a pan and started frying them up. It took us all evening. We didn’t finish tell 10:30 but it was totally worth it. They actually turned out pretty good. Not really very crunchy and potato chip like but more like really thin oily French fries but they taste oh so good.