Wednesday 28th July

We’re really running behind whatever schedule we are on this week. I had another day yesterday carting the remaining statues from Frank Haikus’ studio, we got the last of the panels into the container about 3pm, not without a bit of a struggle. But all done. Some rope blocks and pulleys would have been a real help, but we have people instead here.












We spent today putting in the last of the posts, and started on the first wall, hopefully by lunchtime tomorrow it will look a bit more completed than at present for the school trip to see our new composting area. It looks quite impressive already, just with one side up, by the time we all get stuck in tomorrow it should be at the 3 or 4 sides stage.






We had a visit from a person who is trying to get recycling going here, and as we are starting to get a name finally in Honiara for what we do, he came to us with a proposition for us to start collecting and chipping the plastic bottles etc, which is something I’ve had in mind, but a long way down the track, let me finish something first before loading more on. I’m all for it, but we will need more area, as if I haven’t mentioned that before. All we have at present is sufficient for the nursery, and the composting, although I can see that growing like Topsy as well. My idea of compressing the compost into 20kg bales is taking root. If we can get a consistent supply of waste products, between sawdust, chicken manure, and brewery waste, we stand a good show of having a good mix. With a bit of green mulch spread through from the chipper. Getting the right amount of nitrogen into it to decompose the sawdust is going to be the biggest hurdle, I’m hoping the brewery waste will supplement the chicken manure, and if we can get brewery sludge as well as the spent mash the moisture content should be fine.

I’ll have to pay a visit to Ranadi Tip and see what is available there for a recycling centre for the plastics. Then we go back to the usual arguments with the City Council, who can’t seem to get their own organisation doing it, but don’t want anyone else doing it either. At times I think baseball bat diplomacy is something that there should be more of.

The Official Nursery Opening is for the first week of October, so the next couple of months are going to be a bit hectic. If only everything went to schedule I’d be feeling a lot happier about it all. Then again, I don’t get much enjoyment out of things that just plod along either, I like it when everything is a panic, and you can make decisions and just do it, without going backwards and forwards with committees for everything, and interminable discussions that only come up with what you were going to do days or weeks before.

I mentioned last year while I was working at Rove Prison about the earth snakes that were in the soil we got from Tetere. We found some today digging out the postholes, and I finally managed to get some pics of them. The guys were standing well back, I don’t know if they are poisonous or not, the general rule here seems to be that every snake is poisonous, but I figured something so small that eats ants eggs isn’t going to have much of a mouth to bite with, ok, I could be wrong, but what the heck. If anyone does know more about them please let me know.





They are small, about 100mm (4 inches) long, and extremely fast. I was having to catch them with one hand, throw them back on the heap of soil, take a pic, then grab them again for another pic to make up for the ones I missed. Out of a dozen shots, I got three that caught 2 of the snakes. The bright red one vanished into the soil or grass faster than I could find it. I’ve seen them in yellow, blue like in the pics, dark blue, bright red, black, brown, and green. Whether different species or just natural variation I have no idea. They would make great herpetologists specimens, if you like that sort of thing. Keeping up with ants eggs may be a bit awkward at times though.

Plus you would never see them unless you had a set up like an ants nest glass box.

Ah, ok, get an antbox, fill it with ants, and put a couple of earth snakes in, you’d never be worrying about the ants getting too numerous.

I’ve mentioned Zoe in here a few times, nice lady, in Michigan, she’s bought herself a small country house down a dirt track, that she is going to renovate. Ok, how do you write that so it is the house not the dirt track she is going to renovate? Huh? Well? She has started a blog about it, early days yet, I’ll keep on at her to remember to update whenever she can, but please call over there and say hello, and offer words of encouragement. I’m having trouble posting comments with FireFox, IE7 seems to work, FF blocks the captcha box, despite having it set to allow. If you have trouble posting comments try IE7 if you are using any other browser.

http://littlehouseonthedirtroad.blogspot.com/

Should find Zoe and her little house

Just reread this before saving, God I ramble all over the place don’t I? Oh well, life isn’t a straight line at the best of times for me. Well, apart from born to dead, but even then I seem to be taking a circuitous route.

Monday 26th July

Ok, I got nothing that we had planned done today, but I did get to finally see Frank Haikus new workshop and carvings. We used the new truck to shift them from his workshop to the wharf, they are for the new Solomon Island Chancery in Port Moresby. Beautiful carvings, as the pics show. All from Vasa, which is a very dense heavy smooth grained timber. Each of the posts weighs 1 tonne, according to the reading off the truck pressure gauge, and I was probably doing so many illegal things with it today that after the first thing, the rest didn’t matter.






Along the lines of having the arm fully extended, letting the hook out even more, then pulling the posts out to where I could actually lift them using the arm retraction to pull the posts with.

It did get a bit interesting, but everything was done slowly, so any accidents would have happened in slow motion, till the weight took over and things sped up. No damage to anyone, other than a bruised knee and ankle from trying to stop a post falling. As far as I was concerned, it wants to fall, let it, we can always pick it up, or make another. Legs etc are harder to replace. And a tonne of falling timber isn’t going to notice anyone in the way to start with.







As you can see in the pics, there is a shortage of lifting gear, no rope blocks, pulleys, block and tackle, but we have no shortage of people. And accidents are common.

We’ve got another day there tomorrow, about 16 carvings to ship out, plus panels. They all look really good, all the different provinces represented, samesame as I discussed with Frank last year with Heritage Park.

He has another carver working there making a traditional canoe for the Chancery as well, hand adze and saw is all, wooden pegs holding it together, as the pics show. I’ll try and get back next week when he starts doing the finishing carvings on it. All up, it takes about a month to hand make a canoe to this level, with the carvings, the usual local fishing ones about 1 – 2 weeks.


Which puts us a bit behind with the compost bins, but welcome to the Solomons. I have a contact in Solbrew finally, so we will be starting with the brewery waste very soon, I’m interested in seeing how effective it is for decomposing sawdust, and how long it takes. The info I have found on waste brewery sludge has time periods of 6 weeks to 12 weeks, depending on the water used, the brewing process, and what type of grain used for brewing. The nutrient levels are better than most other organic waste, other than chicken/pig and cattle manure, but given the quantities, I’m not going to get overly concerned about a couple of % points. And we have chicken manure on a regular basis to add more nitrogen anyway.

I’m keen to get it started, mainly to start cleaning up around Honiara, at present it is either dumped into Ranadi tip, or flushed out to sea, neither a good long term solution. Given that there is no fertiliser manufacture here, everything is imported, which makes the price of fertiliser prohibitive, if we can start producing a good composted fertiliser for the local farmers, everyone wins. And we might even make a profit, I’m trying to be King of the Golden River in Honiara. In passing reference to T. Pratchett and The Truth.

The new truck handles well, we had 5 tonne in it this afternoon, and it floats along Mendana, well, inbetween the potholes more, but that samesame sort of feeling. Good hydraulics and power assist everything makes a difference.

I’ve been mentioning the upcoming Elections lately. Here is another interesting note to add to the others.

Honiara has been without rice in any of the shops or warehouses for a week now, due to all the people standing for election buying up every last grain to use in campaigning. Not that it is called a bribe, or payment etc. With 508 people standing for 50 seats, and from todays Solomon Star one person alone bought and shipped 4 tonnes of rice to the constituency he is campaigning in, there hasn’t been much left to go around. I saw a truck of rice being delivered to one of the election offices this afternoon, in Honiara, so whoever is supporting that candidate is sure to get some.

It’s interesting though, we were tossing ideas around in the truck driving through town, and I decided I’ll call my party the Rice Party, and have a rice grain as my symbol, because from one small rice grain, we can grow more, and it symbolises my Parties desire to help the Solomons grow from one small seed, into a land of plenty. About then the guys in the truck couldn’t stop laughing. I was most hurt. I thought it sounded such a good slogan and election promise.

Every party has a symbol, mainly because of the 100’s of different languages here, including Pijin and English, so it helps the voters know who to vote for. Everything from Eagles, (mainly Malaitan), to fish, flowers, canoes, aeroplanes, bushknives, spears, flags. With 508 people standing, there are a lot of symbols going around.

Weekend 23rd to 25th July

Friday 23rd July

We’ve made a start on the compost area, it was starting to get a bit out of hand with people bringing tree prunings and leaf litter for us, plus our usual 3 truckloads of sawdust a week starting to pile up. The hold up has been getting water for the concrete, with only one truck available till the new one was certified and registered it has been a juggling act. We’ve got 14 posts in place, enough to start putting the sides up on Monday while we continue putting posts in for the other bins. I was thinking it looked a big area, now I’m feeling it isn’t big enough. Each bin will hold 120 cu.m of whatever, which should be enough to keep everyone happy, but I keep thinking BIGGER!!!!!!! We can use it!!!!!!!!

We have an area 12 metres by 20 metres, with 4 bins, well, open ended walls with a 5 metre spacing. If we can get into Solbrew, and a bigger supply of chicken manure I think we’ll be working continuously through each bin as it matures. It’s good though, utilising what till now has just been dumped into the tip or the harbour, or into the streams and rivers. We do need a larger supply of nitrogenous material though, the spent brewery waste has a reasonable amount, but with the amount of carbon we’re putting through as sawdust we’ll never have too much. One bin will just be green non-shreddable stuff, it will rot down, but takes time. The others I’ll trial different mixes, sawdust/brewery waste/manure, brewery waste/manure, and flourmill waste/brewery waste/manure, and we’ll work out which one or combination works best.

Security warnings for the election are getting a bit more dire. As I mentioned in a previous post, I’m between the bridges, Lungga River bridge between me and the airport, and Matinikau and Chinatown bridges at the city side. Which is ok, if it gets nasty in Honiara I can possibly make it over the Lungga River bridge to the airport, unless it is really barricaded, then I’m stuck where I am. If, and it is only if at this stage, things do go upside down, the city is the last place to be trying to get through anyway. I think I’ll be packing the suitcase and having the laptop and camera ready to go from the day before, and trying to make it to the airport. I’m fairly sure RAMSI would be securing the airport, as well as the embassies and consulates first, and evacuating anyone wanting to go. It’s going to be interesting.

It’ll be a case of making sure the truck is fueled up, I have food for a week or two at least in the house, and water, and keeping the mobile charged and cashed up. The election day should be ok, it’s not till the actual announcement of Prime Minister 10 days later that things tend to go awry.

We’ve given up with the little truck, it’s going for tender as is where is, and may God have mercy on whoever buys it. 12 months of living in a garage being worked on and it is in worse condition than originally. But the Mitsubishi more than makes up for it. Nice high cab, you can see the problems happening ahead of you on Prince Philip and Mendana Ave instead of suddenly arriving at an “OH S$^*&($&$” moment in driving history. And the brakes work really well.

Just been talking to my son, my grand-daughter Jesse has a bad Staph infection which may have affected her heart, they are still waiting on test results to come back, so far everything is looking good, but it didn’t look good apparently for a while this week. I feel so sorry for Damian, he always gets the short end of the stick, but to his credit, never gives up and manages to come out on top. Hopefully Jesse will bounce back, she’s too full of life to let anything keep her down. As for Kahu, he’s like the Energiser Bunny on steroids.


Saturday 24th July

I’ve found out what I won’t be stocking up on, Campbells Soup in tins, well, certainly not the one I bought anyway. Or any of them really, it isn’t worth spending an hour or so throwing up after eating it. I bought a couple of tins ($24.00 each) this morning at Wings, thought for a change from rice or pasta I’ll have soup tonight, which I did, but it didn’t stay down for long. I’ll stick to my usual rice and pasta and fresh fruit from now on, I’ve not been sick from food since I’ve been here, till today. Lesson learnt. Plus it was probably so overdate anyway, like most tinned stuff or bottled goods here.

I’m convinced we get every countries rejected or out of date stuff.

Sunday

I’m over the food upset from yesterday, thankfully I threw it up before it travelled through me too far.

I was up early and down to Kukum Market, and stocked up on fruit and greens, I’m not going to venture outside my staples from now on. Pineapples are still expensive, between $25 and $40, watermelons between $5 and $50, bananas and pawpaw still the same price as usual, but eggs have gone up $3 a 10 tray, to $30 now.

Made banana cake when I got back home, added cinnamon and nutmeg, so it is sweet and very rich, nice slathered with butter though.

Steve called around and went over security issues for the election period, there is no real warning being issued, but only past experiences to go by, so it may pass over peacefully, or it may not. So the boy scouts motto rules. Heading for the airport if it turns belly up is the best option, any trouble will be in Central Honiara or West Honiara, and RAMSI will be securing the airport as a precaution. All I have to be able to do is get over the Lungga River bridge. As suggested, get the truck moving and don’t stop, it has enough weight to move any barricades, which are usually taxis or buses. In a way I’m almost hoping there is something happening, add a bit of excitement to my usual go to work, come home, go to work routine. So long as it is happening a long way away from me.

I’m hoping to have the compost bins finished by Tuesday, or at least all the posts done, and the sides on at least 3 completed so we can start filling them, we need potting mix, although another few weeks waiting while we build all the structures won’t matter. No sign of the irrigation pipework yet, it should be here soon we hope, then we can start arguing with SIWA over getting water connected. There is still the fence across the paddock to put in, and the gates, trenches for the irrigation, weedmat to lay our and peg down, posts for the shadecloth, it all sounds a lot but seems to get done once everyone knows what to do.

Friday 23rd July

I'm running out of time at the moment, expect Mondays post to be a novel.

Tuesday 20th July

The new truck got a new floor today it’s only temporary till we can spare some money for timber but will suffice for a while. Only a single ¾ inch ply thick though so we won’t be putting a lot of weight on it for a bit although the timber bearers underneath are close spaced enough to carry one of the street tubs.

I finally got to Chinatown school today, for an afternoon with the Environment class they have. About 40 8 – 12 year olds, all keen and from the questions they had, smart with it as well. I talked myself into doing a series of classes with them over the next few weeks, all environment related, reef fishes, pollution, composting etc, so that will be good.

Tiff informed me when I got back that she has organised a meeting with Kastom Gardens, for us to organise sharing resources, mainly in teaching, we cover some subjects they don’t, they do some we don’t, so I have a meeting on Friday with their head teaching co-ordinator.

We should have all the posts up this week, and the compost bins made, it’s taking a bit to organise as we are still doing our normal work through town, and pulling crew off as available to work on the nursery. Add in the usual few who are missing for one thing or another and we never seem to have a full crew every day the last couple of weeks. The young guys we took on a month ago are all still with us, and still working hard, which is good. I think the option of working and getting paid, versus not working and having no money is a good incentive.

Elections are in a fortnight, August 4th and the security warnings are going out. Any non working spouses or partners of RAMSI or Aid agencies are being advised to go on holiday in Australia until 3 weeks after the 4th, I have to get my mobile phone reset it receives text but won’t send again, and Steve checked with me to day to make sure I have a vehicle available for the 4th and afterwards. I’m sort of stuck on the outskirts of Honiara here, on the wrong, or right, side of the Matanikau and Chinatown Bridges, with the Lungga River Bridge between me and the airport. Pacific Casino Hotel is below me, but as it got burnt out in the last election riots, I don’t have much faith in it being a safe haven this time either. Most of Chinatown got burnt out in 2006 and a fair bit of damage done around Honiara for a few days till the police arrived in force to calm it down. I think I’ll sit it out in the house and keep a low profile for a while.

The election proper is on the 4th, then all the various political parties start the spoils division to see who can bribe the most people into joining together to form an alliance. Then they elect a Prime Minister, who then selects people for the various ministries. Sometimes, as in 2006, the wrong choices are made and there is a bit of a riot, hopefully it will be a bit calmer this time, RAMSI have had an increase in police and army numbers from New Zealand and Australia, Papua New Guinea and Tonga, Samoa, and Rarotonga, and the army trucks are in high visibility mode going through Honiara every day now.

It’s a bit different to elections in other countries I’ve lived in, but still interesting.

Sunday 18th/Monday 19th July

Pic from Auckland Kohimaramara Beach at sunset



Some ungodly time in the early morning, and she goes swimming.


Sunday 18th July

The new truck finally arrived at work Friday afternoon, too late to check it out fully, but it definitely needs a new deck, at present the plywood deck on it is almost see through towards the back. Had a quick look underneath, the supporting timbers look ok, it’ll just be a matter of replacing the rotten plywood with 6 x 1 planks hopefully. It’s about 2 metres longer than our other truck, bigger motor as well, and a 3 tonne hoist.




Other than that, Friday passed as usual for the end of the week, no major trauma, we’ve got the layout beds reasonably levelled, well, the bigger holes are filled anyway, I sprayed all the edges and boundary fence again with glyphosphate, to make sure all the weeds die.

The weekend has been hot, dry and sweltering. I didn’t get to do any shopping, too hot to go walking anywhere, but managed to get all the washing done, and the floors washed.

Monday 19th July

Sweltering hot today, till about 4pm when it finally started raining after the obligatory thunderstorm for about 10 minutes. Not that the rain lasted long, just enough to drop the temp about 5*C though, so it did feel a lot cooler.

Andrew, Misi and I managed to get profile pegs and a string line up today around the shade house area, swinging a sledge hammer in 30*C+ sunshine is not recommended. We all had a turn, I think I’d have been comatose if I’d been doing it on my own. I’ll have to get a good thermometer and start checking the temp out in the field, we’ll need it once we get plants out there.

I was considering just having a small shaded layout bed, about half of one length, but after today I think we’ll need at least one full bed, and maybe another one depending on how much we can get growing. We still haven’t a water supply, nor building permission yet, so I don’t know if what are doing is legal, illegal or inbetween.

The new truck works, we had to tow start it this morning, I think the park lights had got turned on on Friday and the battery was a bit flat, but it started ok, and the hoist works, brakes, etc so I’m pleased. The wire rope on the hoist has been a bit salt spray covered from the sea journey from Japan, but a few pints of oil and some rag has cleaned that up a lot better. A couple of things that will need fixing before we can get it certified, a broken stanchion on one side for the foot rail, and the floor at the rear of the tray is almost non existent, badly rotted out. We have some ply sheets spare from another job, so they will do for a quick patch until we get some 6 x 1 timber and redo the entire floor properly. A lot of salt rust spots on the paintwork, but nothing major or detrimental to running it.

I’m redoing the entrance into the Memorial Gardens, it is too waterlogged there for the Carillia trees, and there is a group of dead trees, well, there were dead trees, as you walked into it. I’m doing a circle of standard Bouganvillea, red and white alternately, if I can get enough trained up a 3’ stake and bushed out, with some Cordyline australis as a background. I’d love some Phormium, but I never bought any seeds back with me. The Cordyline seeds have started sprouting, and the Jacaranda mimisfolia as well. Still waiting for the Sophora microphylla though, they can take months to beak the seed dormancy.

I’ll put my usual Hibiscus in the Memorial Gardens as well, they are so reliable here and I have a few good colours available. Keep them trimmed below the height of the Bouganvillea, I’d like to get the Bouganvillea up to 5’ if I can, as a standard, then let them droop with the flower bracts each season.

Wednesday 14th July

The brown dead grass line is the nursery boundary, a lot of area for us to fill on the left of it.





We’re finally seeing progress with the nursery. I had 3 of the guys helping mark out and dig post holes for the day, so far the composting area is all dug, and a couple of holes left on the shade house. We get the posts and timber tomorrow for the compost bins, and the posts for the shade house so hopefully by Friday we’ll have them concreted in and ready for the timber and shade cloth by next week.

We need a bit of fill for the hollows and holes where the weedmat is going for the lay out area, but no great worry over that. Still waiting for the irrigation to arrive, but everything else is looking good.

The new truck is still with Customs and Excise, no reason given, all the paperwork has been processed, but they are still holding it.

Tiffany is away again with Malaria I think it is her 3rd dose for this year, not that there is much of her to start with, she still loses weight with it. I’d love a few 44 gal drums of DDT to spray the White River area with, and get rid of the bloody mosquitos once and for all. It’s like a swamp there, river and streams and roadside waterways all full of rubbish, ideal breeding ground for mosquitos.

The Elections are set for the 4th August. From what I’ve been told most of the RAMSI civilian people have been told to go home for a holiday till the new Parliament is sworn in, after the riots that followed the 2006 election and Parliament decision. I’ve not had any word from Steve about what I’m meant to do, but I think I’ll just keep a low profile till things settle down, if necessary I’ll follow my emergency plan and hide out in King Solomon or Mendana hotel bar till everything settles. Or the airport bar. Could be expensive though.