Of course, the world has come back to bite me on the bum after having such an uneventful day yesterday...
Up at 6 and breakfast at 7 before heading down to the project site at 8. I was leader today so me and Jess, my deputy, were in charge of putting people into their groups. Then we started on the work, which was mixing sand, gravel, water and cement powder together to make concrete, as well as digging a trench around the base of the kindergarten/nursery which is currently being built. Eventually it will form a pathway around the building, but it's a long way from being done at the minute!
We were working until about 11, which was really tiring by itself, (even just the uphill walk to the kindergarten had been enough to wear me out) let alone as the sun got hotter and hotter, but I made sure to take plenty of breaks and drink a lot of water to cope as best as I could. Everyone was acting Mother Hen and making sure that I was well rested, so I was well looked after.
Before heading back to camp for lunch, we visited the existing nursery, which is in a very ramshackle old building which is actually the village church 'on loan'. It's decorated with pictures of animals etc all over the walls, but it looks like it could fall down any minute. We met the children there just before they were picked up by their parents, speaking to them and playing games with them. As always, they're all so friendly and excited to be able to show off their English and pose for photos.
The drama happened just after lunch. I was exhausted and so after I'd finished eating I put my head down on the table and closed my eyes, quickly falling asleep. Only somehow I managed to actually pass out in my sleep, so when people tried to wake me up, I didn't respond at all. The long and the short of it is that I had a lot of cold water poured over me (again) and ice packs pretty much all over my body until I eventually came round. I don't really remember much of what happened, other than just wanting to go back to sleep and being annoyed when they wouldn't let me! Despite my protests, I had to take a trip to the local clinic for them to double check that I was okay, but in the end they decided that it was probably just a combination of my fatigue together with the heat and a little bit of dehydration (even though I had already drunk more than 4 litres that morning...)
When I got back to camp, the others had already gone back to the kindergarten to continue project work, so the peace and quiet in camp meant that I could take a nap, and I was only woken up a couple of hours later by the others arriving back again. Everyone seemed really concerned about how I was and I was greeted with a lot of hugs, which was nice! Now that we've been here this long everyone has really bonded as a group and everyone is so supportive of each other.
I don't want to use my chronic fatigue as an excuse, but manual labour together with the heat out here is a completely new experience for me and I'm still learning my boundaries and when I need to take a break. I don't really mind that I have a lower threshold than the others; it can be frustrating at times, but I'm still pushing myself as much as I can and I know that that in itself is something I should be proud of. Everyone else keeps telling me how proud they are of me and what I've achieved out here, so maybe it's about time I started listening to them more!
8:30pm
After dinner, Dave introduced us to Vomping, which is a technique from Canada to help you deal with issues within a group without it getting too bitchy. It was only our first one, so I think it sort of left us feeling a bit more tense than we did before, but all of us agree that once we get used to bringing up issues in that format then it seems like it will work pretty well!
And now there's just a little bit of time for some stargazing (the sky is really clear tonight and everyone's raving about it) before I head to bed...
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