We live in a compound (closed-in yard). There is only a 2-bedroom guest house and our cottage within the compound. Our compound has 2m (6.5 feet) high walls on 3 sides and a fence and gate on the 4th side.


Our guard dog’s name is Krum (pronounced kroom). She chases the little natives, who tease her outside the fence, but lets the adults into the yard – they come to do our laundry and bring fresh fruit and veggies to our door to sell.


Kel is in charge of pumping water, since the generator is in our compound. We live in an octagon-shaped cottage, with a thatch roof (grass covering on sloped four windows and door and a mosquito net hanging over our bed. The net and camping beds work great. (Anybody up for permanent camping?)


We recently set up a drinking-water filter system, and Josie has a 2-burner gas stove with a good size propane tank.


We have amazing bird life in this place: guinea fowls, green parrots, long-tailed starlings, ordinary starlings, ring-necked doves, hornbills, a very colourful roller (not the lilac breasted roller found in the South), hawks and eagles of different kinds, herons, egrets and other water birds. Recently at dusk we saw a nightjar, with trailing tail feather on each wingtip - it looks awesome in flight. Jonathan has a bird book that covers the whole of Africa. We want to identify some of the birds whose names we don't know. We’ve seen storks in a flock (or maybe cranes), and at night we’ve heard a screech owl hunting the bats. He lives in the rafters on the porch of the guest house, and I’ve seen him a time or two in the day.


Wild animals are very scarce. We saw 2 hippopotamus in a large body of water, off the river near our village last month. Kel saw a hedgehog once. Apparently there’s a small forest 8 km (5 miles) south of us, with huge trees, vines and monkeys and baboons living in the forest. The others have seen it, and we need to go and see this rare occurrence in the African bush. Apparently the local village people look after the forest. It must be a remnant from previous times, when forests were more abundant here.


There is, however, an abundant supply of domestic animals: donkeys, long-horned cattle (used to pull the carts), horses ridden by natives and Arabs, pigs, goats, chickens, sheep, ducks – Kel had to stop the motorbike abruptly the other evening to avoid hitting a sheep.


Drums, sometimes played on their own and sometimes accompanied by singing, are part of the culture. Occasionally the village drums go all night, and it’s difficult to get a good night’s sleep.


The weather has been dry for weeks – in fact, we have not witnessed a drop of rain since arriving in Chad. We had a one-day dust storm 4 weeks ago. Before the sun sets, it disappears in the dense dust on the horizon. Apparently in April we’ll be getting more dust storms as the North-East wind blows across the Sahara desert. Gary tells us visibility is reduced to 100m (328 feet) at such times, so the guys won’t be flying then.


There has been quite a bit of smoke in the air recently. The natives set the fields alight after bringing in the harvest (millet, rice, sorghum & sesame seeds). Rains come at the end of May, and the wet season continues thru October.


Transportation here is as follows: people travel on bicycle, motorcycle, truck or bus. Goods move by ox cart. It’s incredible to see what the locals can load onto an ox cart, which is pulled by wild-looking longhorn cattle. We travel by motorcycle, but the thick sand is building up on the roads, and it’s quite a challenge to keep the bike riding in a straight line when you hit the sand patches. Secret is “power on in the sand.”


We can obtain all kinds of foods: rice, peanuts, millet, black-eyed peas, potatoes (found only in the bigger cities, like N’djamena & Moundou), sweet potatoes, tarow, okra, tomatoes, lettuce, onions, garlic, celery, dill, papaya, bananas, mangoes (mango season just started and will run thru April) & all kinds of groceries (pasta, etc.). Kel has used the hand grinder we brought to mill flour (from millet, soybeans, rice, sorghum and peanuts) which Josie turns into delicious home-baked bread, by means of a camping oven she borrowed. It sits on the gas stove.


Other interesting items found in our market are motorbike parts, hardware, tools & implements (hand-made), bicycles & parts, plastic containers. Josie had an artisan make a flour sifter by hand while she waited. Several weeks ago we needed a steel bucket for construction. Gary went to the market, where an artisan was making buckets from empty 45-gallon steel barrels. You will not believe the craftsmanship!


These people are amazingly industrious. You would love the grass mats they weave. They also make their own bricks, and fire them in brick kilns.


Recently we had an interesting visit with the village Chief. We live on the south of Bere in a suburb called Bendele (behn-de-lay). We were introduced to the Chief by Gary and he spoke French to us and Gary translated. Basically, he welcomed us to the area. Kel is known as the “engineer” - and the Chief wished us success in our projects, and that we would build projects that would remain to serve those who come behind.


Our (not-so-typical) workday starts like this: We meet for prayer with the Team at 06h30, then discuss the day’s workload. By 07h00 Kel usually goes off to do some type of building construction with the guys. We now have 6 guys from various parts of the world, and there are several building projects on the go. Josie teaches music to the kids at our church school on Mondays, Wednesdays & Fridays. She cooks for a combined lunch on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and there is a good deal of planning and prep involved, like planning the menu, getting the ingredients from the market and cooking for 10 people. We break during the heat of the day - from 11h30 to 14h30. Lunch is served at 12h00. We have French lesson on Tuesdays & Thursdays at 13h00, taught by a well-educated native in the village. he speaks 3 languages.


For contact with the outside world we are able to access internet at times. It's better now that we have Thunderbird software installed. We can work off-line and read, write and send a batch of mail at one time after logging on to the internet. It's quicker and cheaper than using Internet Explorer. Our modem is a cell phone with internet access (they are rare, and we managed to take one over from a Student Missionary who returned home last December. We connect the cell phone to the laptop computer and use a software dial-up program to send and receive messages. We use our hand-crank short-wave radio to listen to news from the outside world from time to time.


Well, that’s it for this report. May God be good to you!


Kel & Josie