Lore Ahnert-Böckler
Martin Ahnert
P.O.Box 777
Moshi
Tanzania
Fundi Macha is getting the iron door ready
Packing the office car with the rafters, Box and corrugated iron sheets
Stop in Arusha buying vaccum cleaner
Getting to the Riftvalley
Assigned place for the new booster
Building the roof on top of the hut
Buying fired clay bricks locally
Unloading the bricks
"ELCT Jimbo Centre", where we stayd over night
Big driver
Because the door
of the new booster station had to dry up to Thursday morning, we could start to load all
the materials for the booster in Karatu on Thursday morning. We took the door, a big
wooden Box for the transmitter, the rafter, corrugated iron sheets, the iron tubes for the
antenna mast, and the receiving antennas. We bought 2 bags of Cement on the way to Arusha.
In Arusha we had to
bring a letter to the ELCT head quarter. Since the treasurer had not been in, we had to
leave it there without further action. Then we passed by the electric shop Benson to buy a
vacuum cleaner, since all two are broken at the studio for months, and the carpets have to
be cleaned.
It took us 1 1/2
hours up to Makuyuni, the junction to Karatu and just another 1 1/2 hours up to Karatu
because the road is excellently covered in tormarc these days! We passed by the Jimbo
Centre to make the reservation for night accommodation and continued to the hospital.
There we met the personal secretary of the hospital manager, who advised us to return the
next morning at 8 o’clock for morning devotion. There were no officials at the
hospital right then.
So we returned for
morning devotion the next day and had the chance to talk with the hospital administrator
and the doctor in charge. They fetched the hospital technician and showed us the place
where we could set up the small transmitter hut and antennas. They were very much
cooperative and helpful.
Sifueli, the
hospital technician was very skilled, helping to align the box, putting the rafters,
attaching the door and putting the corrugated iron sheets on top of it. Having finishied
all that, we had lunch, further talks with
the hospital administration and took off in the afternoon to buy fired clay bricks for
building the walls around the transmitter hut.
Sifueli knew exactly
how to calculate the number needed, where to get them, and how much they are costing. We
took all 210 bricks on one trip and unloaded them at the transmitter site.
Returning to the
"Jimbo Centre" we bought 2 additional Cement bags, since Sifueli told us the two
previous ones are not sufficient. We returned them to the hospital on Saturday morning. We
had further talks with Samueli about building the walls around the hut, and organized the
necessary sand for it through calling the administrator by phone. We agreed on his salary
to build the transmitter hut. Then I had the chance to plot the frequency occupation plan
at the transmitter site. We could rest in the Jimbo Centre on Saturday afternoon and
returned to Moshi on Sunday, passing the children home of Sr. Angelica, where they opened
the new wing officially with some festivities. We stopped another time in Usariver at the
"Cradle of Love" where everybody was happy to see Prisca again, and how she is
developing.
Martin und Lore