Finishing up

Stuart arranged a final sumptuous dinner for his US visitors at the lovely African-themed restaurant, the Gondwana, which I had read about, but never had the opportunity to visit.  We had a fantastic meal in the Fulani Room there--each room having a unique atmosphere and tastefully decorated with carefully selected African artifacts. 

 

The following day, Fina, of Indonesian heritage, invited 9 of us over to her house on my birthday and served us a delicious Indonesian meal, in what she called dining "léséhan style." This meant sitting on the floor on grass mats and eating from low tables that she had somehow constructed for the occasion...  She had done this a year ago, when I wasn't there, so she made sure she included me this time around. 

the happy, contented guests

I did manage to blow it out...

But now that all those extra guests from the Kaansa dedication have returned home, it has become much quieter at the Center, and I can concentrate on the library again.  I had received an email from my church, the National Presbyterian Church of Washington, D.C., saying that the checks for the various projects sponsored by the Christmas Gifts Market had been sent out, and some $986 was available for the SIL Library.  The Director of Academic Affairs, Paul Solomiac, was delighted because he could now buy the free-standing scanner he so much wanted.  The library will now be able to digitalize documents--which is important as the library is also a significant archives with hundreds--possibly thousands--of publications that will eventually need scanning.  Ideally a selection of these will eventually make it to the new website, but that is still off in the future.

publications in Koromfé

publications in other local languages

I have also been working on getting some bugs out of the eventual web-based catalog, using a test website.  I noticed that the diacritical marks are not displaying properly so have emailed ResourceMate, our software company, to try and diagnose the problem. The wrinkle is that the person that serves as our webmaster for this website is now located in Switzerland, so communication takes much longer. 

Meanwhile, I just received an email from my recent SIL literacy contact asking for information on behalf of a French-speaking person in Mali, wanting help on setting up a village library there.  Fortunately FAVL [Friends of African Village Libraries] happens to have just such a publication in French. . .  And I was talking with Stuart and Cathie over lunch, and they also are thinking that a library in the village in Obiré might be a good idea. . .

On another note, am happy to report that my 91-year old mother finally received the letter I sent her some three weeks ago.  My brother, Cliff, sent me an email with her reading it!  Unlike my late father, she doesn't do email, and since my sister Karin is no longer there to print out my messages, I was happy to hear this.

My mother reading my letter