An adventurous day...sometimes a typical day.

I'll tell you about my adventerous day this week. It was a thursday, like any typical thursday (ok, I'll stop with the Dragnet cameo). After studying Wolof I went out to work in the yard. I have a lamp that I wanted to replace, and some weeds I was going to get up. So after pulling the weeds I worked on the lamp. The lamp was too high for me to reach standing on a chair, and since I don't have a ladder I decided it was best to stand on the tailgate of my truck to hang the light. But when I went to start my truck, it wouldn't start.

I noticed when I turned the key to warm the glow plug I notice the gas needle didn't move-it stayed on empty. It didn't even move up to empty. First time it has not registered, it registered 3/4 of a tank last time I drove it on Sunday. But I wasn't concerned, needles go bad all the time. The truck fired up when I first cranked it, then stalled out. Old truck, been sitting for a week, I wasn't concerned about the stall. And cranked it again. This time, it wouldn't turn over. So I'm thinking the battery, and call my supervisor over to jump me with his truck. Well he comes over and says "you're not getting any gas" and I tell him again about the gas needle. He says, wow, somebody got you. But you can't cyphen every drop of gas from a tank, surely it will register something. And it did turn over, I have to think it's something else. But he suggested we fill a gas tank and put some gas in. After doing that, and pumping the fuel pump, it cranked. So now I'm thinking, yes, somebody did steal my gas and I'll need to go and get some more. My tank holds 40 liters and I was going to buy 20. However (this is the weird part), the tank only held 10 liters, 1/4 of the tank. So there was gas in the truck the whole time. It's never gone bad like that before, never even had a problem cranking. Anyway, got it running again and drove for 30 minutes to warm up the engine. I haven't driven it out of Mekhe since my trip to go shopping 2 or 3 weeks ago. Anyway, now I'll have to keep a close eye on my trip odometer to fill up with gas regularly. And I'm guessing I'll be driving my truck a little more regularly so this doesn't happen again. Least I know how to fix it now.

After that, I did use the truck to fix the lamp. I'll tell you about houses here. Everything is cement-cement walls, cement foundation, cement roofs. Typically they'll put rebarb in the walls as they pour the concrete to make the walls firm. However, the cement on my house is very soft. The last light I hung was very easy to hang. This one, I found the concrete to be quite firm. I was hanging it outside my guard's room-he has a separate building from my house but in my yard. I had some of the neighborhood kids hanging around with me and we talked while I worked on my truck and while I fixed the lamp. 2 of them were saying that I needed to buy some nails to punch into the cement. So I went with them to a hardware store to buy some. And we came back and I was able to hang the lamp, no problems. That was fun working with the kids. I gave them candy for helping.

Then with the work around the house finished, I went for a walk in the market. I saw my welder friend, my shop keeper friend, picked up my shirt I had made, and got a haircut. I had never met the man who cut my hair before. He is Nigerian-didn't know we had any Nigerians in town-and wanted to speak English with me. So I was ok with that. The haircut is a little short-I'd been letting my hair grow out for the last 5 months. My hair grows really slow, and the top is thinner than the sides. I don't like long hair on the side of my head, but don't mind combing the top. I have a military haircut now :) And that's ok with me, this is the way I always cut my hair in college.

So after my adventurous day, I came home, talked with my guard-we also watched XMen. I ate supper, exercised, and went to bed. And that's been a typical day for me this week...I'll study in the mornings, go out after lunch time and visit. I am trying to be respectful of the people during their fast and not even buy food during the day here. Everyone is fasting, in fact it's the first thing they'll ask me when they greet me. I'm having to say that as my testimony quite a lot this week, and I'm grateful for the opportunities to share my faith in Jesus as the only way to gain salvation. Of course they put their faith in the works they do. It's sad how they are caught up in the religion.