Kingdom Hall 9 - It's finished! First meeting.

Such a happy day!

Thanks so much to all my wonderful brothers and sisters who have helped.  Most have been from our local congregations but we've had visitors from all over the world who came to have a share.  Some broke their backs and sweated with us, some fed us, all laughed with us and encouraged us.  There's NOTHING like Jehovah's organization!

 

The car park was covered with shells.

 Arriving for the first meeting, 9 September 2014. 

  Our lovely Linda.

Inside.  The Hall has a lovely warm cosy feel about it.  We're still using the chairs from the old Hall until the new benches arrive.

Sadly Terry and I weren't able to be present for the first meeting, we had to do night security at the new site.  We dropped off the brothers and sisters who live near us and had to leave before the meeting started.

As we drove away the Hall looked so inviting.  A BIG storm was brewing and broke just as the meeting started.  We need to get some sort of sound proofing on the tin roof.  Even so, everyone was happy to be there and happy to have been part of the construction of the first Kingdom Hall build in The Gambia!

Kingdom Hall 8

We've made a lot of progress in the last few weeks.  The rain has been a problem from time to time, as has the heat, but we're very nearly finished.  I still have computer problems so here are a bunch of photos from the past month.

A couple of charming visitors.  the top one is chameleon, they're quite common here but we don't get to see them very often.  I'm not sure which type of lizard the second one is but he was very beautiful.  He climbed up my leg and spent the afternoon on my back, ending up nuzzled in my hair.   CUUUUUUTE!!

Laying the path from the front door to the road went well until it started raining.  When I came in next morning the concrete had dried with rain spots and dog paw prints.

I spent a day making the fence with Gregoire who only speaks French.  Again he has a wonderful way of speaking English.  "Come smoll nells".  Ummm, you want me to bring small nails??  Oui.  Come towEL.  We don't have any towels on site, I had no idea what he wanted.  I pretended to dry my face.  Non.  He made a digging motion.  Ahhh, you mean TRowel!!  These guys try so hard and we have a lot of laughs. . . as we sink slowly into the mud.

 I cut my finger on a piece of the wire so went to get a plaster.  As I came back to Gregoire he did exactly the same thing!  Matching fingers.

Making the car park by hand has been a huge job.  After levelling it all off (with a slight slope for rain) we then covered it in red stones that are so often used here for roads.  The wheelbarrow looks a little worse for wear.  We have another with a bucket but no wheel.

Happy workers.
























This is Terry, and Emiko who has come from California to help us out.





The stones are delivered by truck and crushed with a machine.  

Terry working on the beautiful shutters.  The shutters are my favourite part of the whole Hall, such beautiful wood!

The Taylor Team laying blocks on the generator house.

The blocks on the top half are strange, they're angled to let air flow through.

Photobombed!

Lunchtime.  There aren't any seats in the Hall, we sit on cement sacks, the platform, bits of wood or the windowsill.

Vasile taking advantage of a convenient table to eat at.

We know it's nearly over when we're ready for planting.  Donkey Plants and Spider Lilies.

Planting bougainvillia.  this will be so lovely when it's grown, multicoloured flowers all around the Hall.

Yama taking after her Daddy and learning the electrics.

Terry spent a couple of days in the HOT store room putting up shelves.

 Next time should be the final pictures.   THEN we start all over again with the other Kingdom Hall and Assembly Hall.  

http://www.jw.org/en/publications/videos/kingdom-hall-true-worship/

Kingdom Hall 7

I wasn't able to update the blog for a while, it's a long pitiful tale of a broken laptop and a stolen phone.  Ben found me a way to muddle through today so here are a few highlights of the past couple of weeks.

This is Sompto trying to take over from Vasile.  

Laying the new floor.

 It's always fascinating watching other people work. 

Didn't they do a great job?  

We spent all day making concrete for the floor, it was such hard work!!  I noticed what a colourful bunch we made.

Of course this work couldn't happen without the wonderful sisters who cook for us every day, and a special thank you to their little daughters who help out too.

We've been painting the outside of the Hall.  We use these spray machines which flick concrete mixed with paint onto the wall.  Not as easy as it looks.  But Ben did a great job (of course!!)

 Father and son working together.  Ben was putting old corrugated iron sheets to protect the new roof form the flicker paint.  Terry was supporting it with a long stick.

Our good friend Toye, when he's not laying blocks he's a vet.

I've been learning how to lay kerb stones.  It really is incredible that we've had over 100 people working together with only about 6 of them with building skills.  The training has been amazing, especially since most of the skilled builders don't speak English.  We had an example of that today when I was working with a sister and we discovered we had a hole in our wheelbarrow and the wet concrete kept falling out.  Vasile (from Romania) came to help tilt the barrow so that the concrete would be away from the hole.  He asked us to get "something" for the barrow to stand on so we found a broken block and brought it to him.  He said "That's not a something, that's a nothing, get me another something".  Hahaha, I'm always enchanted by the way foreigners speak English and even more by Vasile who expects us to understand what he wants us to do!! Actually he's doing a great job, it really isn't easy for him and this is the first time he's been in charge of a site.  Big round of applause for Vasile!!!  

 It's one thing to lay in a straight line but it's quite another to go round a corner.  Anna and I were very proud of this one.

THEN we discovered something even more difficult.  Lay blocks down a slope then lay them on the other side so that all the blocks are on the same angle and the same height AND the same distance apart.  You can see why I was so happy with encouragement from Terry and Anna and I were dancing when we managed to lay them just right.

The letters were made to make the Kingdom Hall sign (must be nearly finished now!)
We couldn't resist playing with them first.

On the building the wooden letters were used as stencils.  They were nailed to the wall then flicker painted over and then removed.  It's a nice effect.

Vasile putting the sign up.

Terry and I laying a path.

 We've been working in temperatures from 32 to 37 degrees  (89.5 to 98.5) (but in the full sun so we're MUCH hotter than that) so sometimes we get a little tired. 

Only Dom could get comfy in a wheelbarrow!!

 Finally I was allowed to play with the flicker paint machine.  This was the first section of wall that I did.  It's around the back of the Hall and will eventually be covered with bougainvillia (beautiful climbing plant) but I was proud of it anyway.