Wednesday 19th August.

I’ve put off writing up anything in the hope there would be something good to say, but after 3 days there is still no progress with anything. Monday and Tuesday Tiffany and I spent going through the files looking for everything that had mention of SEB/Forestry/Council and agreements between all 3. I took them into the Japanese Consul, and copied to Keithie as well.

We haven’t heard anything back about the meeting today, which may be good, in that no one definitely said no at the time.

Steve and I went to Don Bosco Training Centre today. It’s a large establishment, just celebrated 150 yrs in the Solomon Islands. They have 300 students at any one time, doing a range of trades, carpentry, engineering, computers, home science, for the Solomons it is well set up, in all probability the equipment there is better than the students will find when they go to work.

They haven’t got anything for me to do there yet, the last course finished last month, and they won’t be running another one till next year. I’m hoping something gets settled really soon with the Gardens, otherwise all I’ve done so far is just wasting time.

One good thing for the week, NPF Plaza finally signed a contract for the gardens there, $2,300 per month, so the crew had a full day going over everything there. It was a little bit overgrown after a month. The bouganvillea were nearly up to the roof line, all the duranta were overgrown and getting straggly. The girls picked up 8 bags of rubbish out of the gardens, and there is still the Civic Centre Gardens we should get next week once they sign the contract. They were after us to start now and then they’d send the contract along later in the week or month. Which is what they did last time and there has never been any contract. I wouldn’t let David or Tiffany send the crew until we had the contract signed and the first invoice sent. If we can do that with everyone from now on it will get us back on the black side of the ledger for the first time this year.

If we can get one more contract similar I’ll be able to give 4 days a week to the crew. We’re down to 12 left now, which is good in one sense that there is enough work to keep everyone busy for the 3 days at present, and one more contract like NPF will give us the income to go to 4 days, I’ll be happy when we can get them all 5 days a week, and overtime for the watering crew at night.

I’ll re-adjust the spreadsheet this weekend, I’d like to do it tomorrow, but the painters want to paint the office walls tomorrow and Friday so there goes that idea. Hopefully the airconditioner will keep the paint fumes down over the weekend and I’ll work in there then.

I still get amazed at how quickly things grow here. I needed two large (8’) delonix for the Rove Prison Garden yesterday, I’ve been promising David there that I’d have them there soon, about 3 weeks ago soon sort of thing. We sent Andrew and Hendry into the bush yesterday to find a couple, they came out with two long trunks, a bit more than 8’, chopped at the top, and chopped at ground level. All we do with them is dig a hole, drop the trunk in place, pack dirt around, water it, and it sprouts new growth in 2 weeks.

There’s no need for rooting compounds, tender loving care etc, just chop, dig, plant stand back..

It’s been a month at least now, and still the letters in the Star about the Politicians Entitlements continue. You would have to be absolutely stupid and as dumb as a rock to be a politician here and think you could get away with giving yourself a $500,000 termination payment every 4 years. Plus the usual inflated Parliamentary allowances. Add in the $50,000 for each wife as well, it is not a good scenario leading up to next years election.

Steve is taking me to Kolombango Province in a couple of weeks if nothing definite is settled soon here. Hopefully I can get a few months in the villages there setting up sustainable gardens and hopefully getting things moving for them. It’ll be a good trip down, 8 hours by island boat, with the fishing lines trolling all the way. No electricity, gas, everything is wood fires and water from the well. But there is good fishing and a beach. I think I need a good break from the internicine squabbles going on here in Honiara.

We had the Solo Idol Competition Final here Sunday night at the Multi Purpose Hall. It was way too small for everyone to get in. I didn’t go, but those who did told me on Monday all the people that got locked out behind the fence started throwing stones onto the tin roof of the hall. Inside it sounded like a continual hail storm, and everyone was waiting for the roof to puncture and stones to start coming through. It must have been interesting, I’m pleased I didn’t go. I think the police finally arrived at 11pm and broke it all up in time for the finish.

I was chatting on skype to a friend in Scotland earlier today, and he asked me if I was ever going to settle down, after the last 20 years of wandering all over the place. I’m not sure what I’m looking for, in fact I probably don’t have anything definite in mind as to whatever it is looks like. I think I’d like to settle, but I don’t have the temperament to just sit still in one place now. I’ll have to sort that out soon though, I’m not getting any younger. Then again, VSA employ people up to age 75, so I could get a few more years out of this if I can make this project finally work. I don’t know if I’m running away from, or running towards, but as I mentioned a few pages back, this is something I’ve thought of doing since I was in school, and it is everything I thought it would be, small aggravations not withstanding.

Adrian called into the Gardens today, he’s getting worse. I know he is in the early stages of alzhiemers, today was the worst I’ve seen him since I’ve been here. He was asking where the work crew were, because he was meant to be with them and he’d driven all over town looking for them. He hasn’t worked with the crew for a couple of months now, so I realised he wasn’t really with it today. I told him everyone was at NPF Plaza, and he wanted to know where that was. It’s one of only two shopping blocks in town, and he shops there at Wings, but he had no idea where either Wings or NPF were. He was driving as well, lord knows where he ended up after he left us. Giving him directions was like looking at a blank face, there was no recognition in his eyes, just blank grey eyes full of confusion. I know he’s just a rascist obnoxious loud mouthed Australian, but I feel sorry for him seeing him lose everything he knows like this.

And he’d forgotten to bring his notebook, so all I could do was write out everything on a sheet of paper and hope he knew what he was looking at. If I ever get like that I hope someone has the decency to pull the plug on me before I lose it completely. Or that I have enough of whatever to end it before I get to that stage.