We Made It!

November 29 - DDay. Actually we moved some things the day before, so Bram and the two ‘old’ dogs decided to sleep on the new premises already. Since dogs don’t handle the pack being separated too well, it was a restless night... That made having to be up & about around 4:30 am almost a relief:-) At the end of DDay we found ourselves with all our stuff in the new yard. Thanks to our builders, who helped out moving the heavy stuff, in between their building activities.


December 1 – Back to work. By now we are settled in nicely in Bram’s 1-room office, which serves as a living / bedroom / 2 offices for now. The dogs seem to love it; the whole pack reunited, and cosy close together.
Coming soon: a full moving- & house progress report!

Woman @ Work

We try to convert the compulsory weed-free zone outside our fence from a barren stretch of sand to a goat-resistant flora reserve. For now covered with thorn bush cuttings because dipodi will eat all small plants - even those they don’t like once the adult spikes start to grow.


Wherever Maud goes she tries to ‘find’ some cuttings. Ask her for dinner and she brings her cutting scissors, let her guard the car and she’ll find something at the roadside.


Better still is friends popping over with something taken from their garden. Our first gift, Tears’ lilies, is blooming fabulous by now.


Last Sunday a Dutch-Surinam-Swedish-Polish delegation visited to see the new house & garden. Greetje brought a big load of already well-rooted cuttings from her huge 2 hectare garden, so Maud can try what works in our soil. And then go to Greetje to take more cuttings of course.


They look healthy now – but they are just planted; gardening in unknown soil and climate involves a lot of experiments...

Man @ Work

Bram’s office-slash-guestroom serves as workshop-slash-storeroom for the time being. Which isn’t much longer cause we move in 4 days, and we’ll have to live in there for starters. Up till now Bram managed to not saw off any body parts while playing around with Rory’s posh saw table…


We had fabulous rain for a couple of days. Much needed for the garden, but the timing was not ideal. Due to lack of supplies, the bedroom roof wasn’t waterproof yet, so it rained inside. Meaning it couldn’t be painted, which holds up all the after-the-painting work. By now the rain stopped, and the truck from Joburg with our waterproofing slurry arrived.


Otsile admires the basics of the non-permeable bedroom roof.


Meanwhile Mister Plumber Block 6 is constructing the sewer for the main house bathroom. Glad Maud didn’t plant her tomato seedlings yet, cause the connection to the sewer from the office to the septic tank involves quite some digging in this part of the vegetable garden.


By now Bathalefi is doing the finishings of everything that involves electricity. Hanging fans, placing spots and dimmers in the ceiling, connecting outside lights – his contribution seems well under control.


Despite the funny? faces he really did make this part of the kitchen himself. We are still waiting for the countertop and sink, that will be fitted into the right hand side. Bram is standing where the stove will be.


Bram’s old office serves as storeroom for New Stuff. Note the posh bosch stove:-) and the washing machine:-) We know that won’t mean much for Europeans, but for us it’s a major step forward! All the time saved by not washing by hand will be put into using 4! burners and an oven! to the maximum.

Ga Gona Metsi

Our neighbors Benny & Lianne.
Niks water nie – a big truck crashed into a ditch and broke the main main sweetwater pipe to our (and some other) villages. We regularly have no water for up to half a day, and everyone is prepared for that with metsi stored in jerry cans. Now this ga gona metsi situation takes longer, and when the stored water is finished we all hope it’s just our neighbourhood and start walking down the road to restock – in vain. At the end of the day water affairs drives around the villages, announcing the ‘pompo’ is broken and only will be fixed tomorrow. This is by the way how we get all the really ‘need to know’ information; a megaphone car drives around the village making announcements.

Our Builders

Our master builder & son Bashi signs his-our house with his handprint in the outside plastering next to the front door.


We contracted Bashi’s uncle Ntsimo One Thousand to do all the painting.


Rra Ntsimo and his helper finish the first layer of white paint in the bedroom.


Now that all the ceilings are in, the kitchen & living room can be painted, and then tiled.


Our second-in-command and principal tiler Foraman.


You can take pictures now.


Another milestone: the outside plastering is well almost finished.


Bashi’s younger brother Kagiso graduated from just another gofer to a junior builder by now.


Our electrician (and our friend Dineo Johnson’s cousin) Bathalefi is our hero cause he got us through Power Corporation’s inspections in one very short go.

Gatherers

So that’s why the goats won’t eat sisal. Still, paying attention to digging out as much roots as possible will boost results when replanting them outside our fence.
Bram of course doesn’t miss any photo opportunity. While doctor Sandra says ‘Come, let’s rinse so I can check the damage’, Bram shouts ‘No, wait, I have to get my camera and take pictures first’.


Gathering sisal was just a nice extra. Our expotition with Sandra & Rory and The Boys is aimed at getting aloes, and whatever other nice flora we encounter. The roadsides south of Gaborone are packed with aloes, and when we finally find a gate to a dirt road that leads us into the lands we can dig left, right and centre. Being law-abiding Scots & Dutchies we are a bit nervous about how (il)legal this is, but nobody seems to mind.

Utilities

Next to the building we have to get connected to ‘motogaz’ (electricity from Botswana Power Corporation) and ‘sweet water’ (water from Botswana Water Affairs).


BPC first sends about ten men: one to dig a hole for the pole, one to manage him, and the rest to take a rest. After a week with a hole fit to catch a lion in front of our gate, another crew turns up to put the pole and connect the public wiring to Bram’s office.


That makes us all set for the exiting part: will our electrician’s work get through the BCP-inspection? Batalefi is convinced it will take less then ten minutes, and then we’ll have the power. He’s right; when we think the inspectors just started, they are already handing over papers and our motogaz-card, so we can buy units for our connection!


Once we apply for sweet water, Water Affairs sends a JCB within a week to dig the trench to the main pipe. At the end of the second day we are the proud owners of a water meter, a standpipe, and … a parking lot! This saves us a lot of work; the spot Bram wanted to clear for guest parking only needs levelling now.

Surinamers in Botswana

When Bram meets Jon at the Koninginnedag party 2009, they discover their communal background is Surinam – and of course they have an ever-growing collection of communal people they know. The perfect opportunity to catch up is of course a fabulous Surinam dinner, cooked by Jon.


Young mister Van Zyl is far more interested in gaming then in food.

Bird’s Hide

We thought the first squatters in the new house would be vervet monkeys, but they only visit – quite regularly. Our actual roommate is a bird that makes a nest right above Maud’s desk-to-be. The builders leave a nice hole in the plastering for an entrance, so we hope they will have left by the time we wanna enter.


It’s amazing our bird just keeps feeding her young while the builders keep building.


Right now the second and most exiting roof is being poured: the concrete top / terrace on top of the bedroom (upper left hand corner). As if the making of zinc roof on the main house wasn’t nerve-wrecking enough!


Looking down from our future roof terrace (with a to be shade, fridge, hammocks – the full Monty), our dwelling resembles an eastern temple complex.


And another load of cement bags. It’s amazing how much goes into just one small house! The Mother of all (our dogs) doesn’t only help us with the gardening; she also keeps an eye on everything that happens on site.


And another load of river sand. Foundation, bricklaying, plastering, floors, roofs – everything seems to eat cement, sand, gravel and water.


And another load of steel – despite the Afrikaans we do order everything in Gabs or Mochudi.


Plastering inside…


… and outside.


The real building management: Dammit Louis (left) and Nadia, right on top of it when it’s their shift.


All the sand has to be sieved before it is fit for building.
The pile of stones in front of the house is in fact a big circle around the braai area. We do try to fit in!


It’s amazing how fast one learns. For starters Maud knew basically nothing about gardening in this climate and soil, but thanks to loads of advice from friends some things, actually more and more, turn out nicely, like the lilies we got from Tears.


Imagine we’ll live in there by the end of this month…


Our girls Lisa (left), Moira, Nadia enjoy a well-earned rest on their brand-new furniture after another day of sweating their asses off.

Moving forward

Everyone who tells us to update our blog more often: THANKS! It’s really great to know people actually like our posts enough to request more! We’ll really try to do better...
So much for ‘well-equipped big companies’… Bashi & Bram thought having the roof-rafters made by one would save a lot of time. In theory, yes, but since the ‘experienced craftsmen’ don’t know basic mathematics like Pythagoras’ law they managed to deliver the wrong sizes, over and over. In the end Bashi & crew with hand tools & brains would have been so much faster then brainless morons with fancy machines!


After much hassle and remakes we got ‘good enough’ trusses, meaning stuff Bashi, Foraman and crew could fine-tune to fit.


Another visitor / building inspector: Bram’s way-back-when-friend Eric. After spending years on converting a nice, big, empty plot in Gaborone into a beautiful big mansion, Eric sure has an eye for building!


Now that the trusses are finally up, the roof sheets can be put. First comes the veranda roofing, to prevent the builders from getting seriously damaged when they slip.


Is it strong, Foraman?
Note the view – it’s part of what we see from our roof terrace on top of the bedroom.