Three and half weeks after we broke ground the building has already reached height level.
Everybody has been working very hard to get here. Everyday about 100 people turn out at the work site to carry water, sift sand and gravel, mix concrete and help skilled labors. The women are the first to come to the work site and the last to leave because they carry the precious water to wet the wall early in the morning and late in the afternoon to make it strong. The building will be left to dry for two weeks before we put the roof up. The walls should be watered twice a week everyday.
In the meantime the adult literacy classes are going on. The classes are now held in an open space six nights a week. BwB has provided all the materials necessary to hold the courses.
Seventy-five of the village's adult men and women attend the courses. They will be transferred in the new school after it is completed. We will send you pictures next week on the progress of the schoolhouse construction.
This week I want to talk to you about karitea butter and how it is obtained. Karitea is one of the most widespread trees in Southern Mali. This tree gives a delicious fruit, the kernel of which is tapped by village women into butter. The fruit is collected during the Fall because that's when it is ripe and kept in big holes until the Summer. That's when villagers are less busy.
The kernels are dug out and pounded into a brownish paste. The paste has to be mixed in big bowls by hand for two or three hours to be soft. Then the whole thing has to be boiled for four hours. After that, it is left to cool down for another hour. The butter emerges on the surface and the residue sinks on the bottom of the pot. The precious butter is carefully recuperated into another bowl. Most of the butter obtained from this painful process is sold on the local market to buy other commodities. The remainder is used for the family food.
