25 November 2019
Monday... clearing up and a little more shopping
Today started with a very poorly timed power cut... I was in the shower having just started to wash my hair... head covered in foaming shampoo... and whoops, no light! The generator took long enough to kick in for me to complete both hair wash and shower in the pitch dark... very disorientating!
Mercifully the power was back on in time for breakfast...
The team arrived at 9.30am as arranged and did a good job of clearing up the little room in the hotel that we had been using for making the lights. They made an inventory of everything we have in stock... completed lights, partially made lights, plain wooden bases, electronic components and tools.
Our original plastic box was no longer large enough to hold the tools we have amassed, so we felt a final trip for Andy to Inco to buy a proper toolbox was a must. We also wanted to check out the availability and price of rechargeable AA batteries...so far they have all been bought in UK, but can we get them locally?
I had phoned the regional director of education for Region 3, which covers Albreda, to let him know of our conclusions regarding the solar and computer installation there. He was very interested and suggested that we should contact Lamin, a senior guy in the department of science and technology, to discuss the matter further.
We set off on our shopping trip, calling in to a few places that we felt were likely to have the batteries we wanted. Either no luck at all or very expensive - D400-500 for a pack of two, which works out at between £3.10 and £3.84 each... far too much.
While doing this we managed to contact Lamin... happily he was just finishing a meeting quite near to where we were, so we arranged to meet him at Inco... much better than travelling to his office in Banjul.
We bought a very splendid orange toolbox in Inco and Andy bought a set of spanners as a gift for Abdoulie to keep in the new minivan. We met up with Lamin as arranged and went to a local cafe for our discussion.
He proved to be very knowledgeable about all the school solar installations and we had a very useful hour or so, with him telling us a lot of the history of the project. The decision as to whether or not Pageant will fund any remedial work on the solar at Albreda has yet to be made, but at least we know a lot more about the situation now.
Back to the hotel... time for me to write this blog entry and maybe even sit by the pool for half an hour.
Mercifully the power was back on in time for breakfast...
The team arrived at 9.30am as arranged and did a good job of clearing up the little room in the hotel that we had been using for making the lights. They made an inventory of everything we have in stock... completed lights, partially made lights, plain wooden bases, electronic components and tools.
Our original plastic box was no longer large enough to hold the tools we have amassed, so we felt a final trip for Andy to Inco to buy a proper toolbox was a must. We also wanted to check out the availability and price of rechargeable AA batteries...so far they have all been bought in UK, but can we get them locally?
I had phoned the regional director of education for Region 3, which covers Albreda, to let him know of our conclusions regarding the solar and computer installation there. He was very interested and suggested that we should contact Lamin, a senior guy in the department of science and technology, to discuss the matter further.
We set off on our shopping trip, calling in to a few places that we felt were likely to have the batteries we wanted. Either no luck at all or very expensive - D400-500 for a pack of two, which works out at between £3.10 and £3.84 each... far too much.
While doing this we managed to contact Lamin... happily he was just finishing a meeting quite near to where we were, so we arranged to meet him at Inco... much better than travelling to his office in Banjul.
We bought a very splendid orange toolbox in Inco and Andy bought a set of spanners as a gift for Abdoulie to keep in the new minivan. We met up with Lamin as arranged and went to a local cafe for our discussion.
He proved to be very knowledgeable about all the school solar installations and we had a very useful hour or so, with him telling us a lot of the history of the project. The decision as to whether or not Pageant will fund any remedial work on the solar at Albreda has yet to be made, but at least we know a lot more about the situation now.
Back to the hotel... time for me to write this blog entry and maybe even sit by the pool for half an hour.
It will be Andy's last evening so we are going out to what should be a very nice dinner with Linda and Susan from the hotel... one of the latter's very few evenings off in the year! Let's hope the hotel is still standing when we get back!!!!
We did have a most enjoyable meal and the hotel appeared to be unscathed when we returned... so Susan was able to go straight to bed. Lovely last evening of Andy's stay here... I'll miss him during the next week. Thanks, Andy, for all the laughs, hard work and all round good time... not forgetting the biscuits!!
