This weekend has been busier than most. Saturday morning Elisabeth and I drove from the Jimeta LCCN Compound (N09.27996, E12.44847) to Guyuk to visit Retired Archbishop David Windibizri and his wife Margareth at their home (N09.90310, E11.93101). Elisabeth and the Windibiziri’s have been friends since he was a pastor and Elisabeth was a missionary teacher and school principal over 40 years ago. David is writing a book on the history of his tribe, the Longuda. He has been working on it for many years. A few years back he had a fire at his home and all of his papers burned. Fortunately, Elisabeth had most of it typed into her computer. Since the fire David has not done much work on it. Whenever he gets started something else will come up and he will put it down. Elisabeth has invited him to go to Denmark for 3 months to work on the book. She has done research in the Danish archives and found information about Christianity coming to his tribe. In Denmark he will not have as many distractions. Elisabeth says whatever the results are at the end of the three months that is what the book will be.
When we arrived we greeted Margareth outside in the cooking area and then David greeted us. He had just arrived minutes before us from the funeral of his son’s mother-in-law. He wanted us to photograph the compound of a senior member of his tribe that was still decora
ted with the traditional symbols of respect for a senior on his passing. The compound had a long with ribbon about 4 inches across wrapped around the tops of the structures. The ribbon was made of traditional hand woven material. At the front of the co
mpound they had a grass rope with swatches of grass hanging from it. This indicates that the deceased was a highly respected and senior member of the tribe. If you are only 50 or 60 you would not get this honor. Inside the compound we greeted the family a
nd they showed us the grave. The man was a hunter and his grave was marked with the symbol of a hunter. His grave was beside the hut that had his bow, s
pears and the tails of the animals he has killed. Part of the burial tradition is three days of drinking a local beer made from guinea corn. The three days had past but neighbors were bringing more beer. (Life is not easy for women in Nigeria. Look at the biceps on this young woman. She does not have a gym membership. But a lot of hard work.)
ted with the traditional symbols of respect for a senior on his passing. The compound had a long with ribbon about 4 inches across wrapped around the tops of the structures. The ribbon was made of traditional hand woven material. At the front of the co
mpound they had a grass rope with swatches of grass hanging from it. This indicates that the deceased was a highly respected and senior member of the tribe. If you are only 50 or 60 you would not get this honor. Inside the compound we greeted the family a
nd they showed us the grave. The man was a hunter and his grave was marked with the symbol of a hunter. His grave was beside the hut that had his bow, s
pears and the tails of the animals he has killed. Part of the burial tradition is three days of drinking a local beer made from guinea corn. The three days had past but neighbors were bringing more beer. (Life is not easy for women in Nigeria. Look at the biceps on this young woman. She does not have a gym membership. But a lot of hard work.)The other thing that David wanted me to see was the bad water conditions on his side of the town of Guyuk. Normally, towns where a Local Government Authority is based has the best water supply and the area around the main part of town does have a good borehole, water tower and distribution system. It is only turned on a few times per day. Water supplies for towns with a population of over 10,000 are operated by the Adamawa State Water Board. The well that services Davids part of town broke
many years back. They brought a cable tool drill rig out to the borehole but it broke.(N09.90014, E011.93134) To get water people either walk to the other part of town that has working water and wait for the operators to turn on the water or they buy it from local water sellers. The price is 15 naira for 25 liters of water. In Jimeta they charge 10 naira for water from a borehole. The Guyuk water vendors walk to a dry streambed about 500 meters from David’s compound. (N09.89826, E11.93109) They have dug holes in the streambed and inserted drums with no bottoms. They scoop water from the hole. Some use a funnel with a clothe filter to take out the big chunks. A few years back David had received some money from Minnesota to drill his own bor
ehole. Unfortunately, he fell victim to poor contractors. They told him that there was water at 70 meters and they would drill to 70 meters. Water is at 150 meters in this area. He got a dry hole and did not have the money to go deeper. He wanted me to see the problems of the water and then see if I could do something. What needs to be done is to have conscience civil servants that will get the borehole fixed and this side of the town will have water. 
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