Yesterday was a full day, getting to bed some time after 12:30 am.
Which reminds me of the fun we're having with Estevao, the director, whose heart language is Portuguese. As I'd mentioned, he and his wife have done a great job with their English to communicate with us. Of course there are words in English that they mis-pronounce; it's just to be expected. Some are quite funny. One that gets us all laughing is words that start with "th", for example saying 8:30 (as in AM/PM). Estevao just can't get it out and we have a lot of fun with it. In fact, Corey was trying to pronounce a Portuguese word that Estavao used at dinner, stumbled over it four times, and then said "thirty" instead. Estevao roared.
So, because we were so tired after yesterday (plus Corey woke up in the night, unable to get back to sleep), we took the day to work on minor projects or "housekeeping" tasks. I swapped out some defective hardware with new equipment that also had more capacity. Because lightning is quite frequent and very severe in Africa, much more than most places in the US, I also installed a lightning protection device for the external wireless device, connecting it to the ground rod in the.... ground... of course. This will help keep the wireless access to the internet working for those guests (translation consultants, teachers, etc) who stay in the small apartments.
And then, contrary to all previous days, we actually didn't work through the heat of the day but took an hour or so for a brief nap during the hottest part of the day. I later spent time installing network connections in a new "Internet Room" that is being prepared for nationals coming for training. It will offer power and internet for up to 10 people who wouldn't normally have access for email, updating their computers, or other common tasks that we just take for granted. I should finish this project tomorrow (yes, that's Saturday) and will include a picture of what the room and equipment looks like.
Tonight's brief project was to help Corey record voltages for the battery bank that is charged during the day by solar power and optionally by the generator and which then carries us through the night. Corey is concerned that some batteries are under-performing, causing the whole system to not run as efficiently/long as it should. He will decide if any of the batteries are too weak and should be removed/replaced.
So now it's 10 pm, perhaps not early by normal standards but a whole 2 hours earlier than I normally get this update prepared. Whoo Whee!
Which reminds me of the fun we're having with Estevao, the director, whose heart language is Portuguese. As I'd mentioned, he and his wife have done a great job with their English to communicate with us. Of course there are words in English that they mis-pronounce; it's just to be expected. Some are quite funny. One that gets us all laughing is words that start with "th", for example saying 8:30 (as in AM/PM). Estevao just can't get it out and we have a lot of fun with it. In fact, Corey was trying to pronounce a Portuguese word that Estavao used at dinner, stumbled over it four times, and then said "thirty" instead. Estevao roared.
So, because we were so tired after yesterday (plus Corey woke up in the night, unable to get back to sleep), we took the day to work on minor projects or "housekeeping" tasks. I swapped out some defective hardware with new equipment that also had more capacity. Because lightning is quite frequent and very severe in Africa, much more than most places in the US, I also installed a lightning protection device for the external wireless device, connecting it to the ground rod in the.... ground... of course. This will help keep the wireless access to the internet working for those guests (translation consultants, teachers, etc) who stay in the small apartments.
And then, contrary to all previous days, we actually didn't work through the heat of the day but took an hour or so for a brief nap during the hottest part of the day. I later spent time installing network connections in a new "Internet Room" that is being prepared for nationals coming for training. It will offer power and internet for up to 10 people who wouldn't normally have access for email, updating their computers, or other common tasks that we just take for granted. I should finish this project tomorrow (yes, that's Saturday) and will include a picture of what the room and equipment looks like.
Tonight's brief project was to help Corey record voltages for the battery bank that is charged during the day by solar power and optionally by the generator and which then carries us through the night. Corey is concerned that some batteries are under-performing, causing the whole system to not run as efficiently/long as it should. He will decide if any of the batteries are too weak and should be removed/replaced.
So now it's 10 pm, perhaps not early by normal standards but a whole 2 hours earlier than I normally get this update prepared. Whoo Whee!
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