Ah-OK

Yesterday I went running on the track (hopefully I can provide some pix at some point of this Olympic style venue). After a few laps a guy gave his thumbs up and asked if he could join. Sure. I asked if he ran competitively. "Ah, OK," was the answer. I tried to inquire if he ran maybe 5,000 metres. "Ah, OK. Tomorrow?" No, I meant if you ran competitions in the past? "Ah, OK." Have you done races before. "Huh?" Did you ever run on the track. "Ah, OK." Ok, maybe this: Did you ever run 5,000 or 10,000 metres? "Ah, OK. Tomorrow?"

Language barriers can be something wonderful. He spoke a lot more English than I do Swahili, but we definitely had some funny parts in the conversation. When I left he started speaking Swahili to me and all I could figure out that he wanted me to come back to run tomorrow and then go to his place (he is a student at the local college and lives on campus). But then he seemed to change his mind and wanted to invite me right away. So I explained to him that I am going home now (it was getting dark). He said "Ah, OK" and then seemed confused as I left, expecting me to go with him.

As for the thesis, my prof is busy and I won't get the summary back until after the weekend. I also drew up questionnaires to ask people who used the biogas system so far, as well as one for potential solar cooker users and one dealing with soil erosion prevention measures (and why people don't use them).

Next week I also hope that our test system is working again (not much gas coming out right now and it's possible that because manure was not added frequently enough it has hardened and prevents gas to rise to the top. So the current contents has to be squeezed out and new manure to be added. I hope this can be done by Monday or so. Then it'll still take a few days before enough gas is produced.

I want to then test the different types of cookers they have for efficiency. Vicky from COMPACT wants to have a little display area with multiple different models so I want to see which ones we should pursue.

Today it was raining hard several times since lunch break. Figures, instead of wearing my boots I opted for my sports shoes today. Should be a muddy walk home...

Have a nice weekend everyone