A LONG OVERDUE UPDATE

It is now July 29th and you may have noticed we haven’t written about the project in several weeks. This is because for the last three weeks we have been delayed due to record rainfall and severe flooding in Qinghai. In fact, flooding was so bad that it destroyed the massive concrete bridge that travelers must cross to reach M. Needless to say, the poorly maintained roads to the village were completely impassable under such conditions.

Thankfully, about a week ago we began seeing blue skies and sunshine. Now Qinghai is in the midst of a heatwave, with summer temperatures reaching highs of over 35 Celsius. The roads are dry enough so that trucks and jeeps can reach M. While the drive is much longer without the bridge, we are finally able to proceed with the project. Thus, four days ago David and T Fishy traveled to X county town to meet Elvis and his father.

There they purchased building materials, contacted skilled laborers, and hired two trucks to transport the supplies. They also checked in with the future shopowners, whose 30-day motorcycle repair training is now complete. We were all excited to find them in high spirits and hear from their teacher that they are both enthusiastic and dedicated students. For the duration of their training, they worked from 7:30 am to 7:30 pm every day. One of the two returned to M with David and Elvis to help with construction. They now both have extensive knowledge of basic repairs, and have some experience with fixing engines and electrical wiring. Their teacher believes that with time and practice, they will be competent mechanics with a successful shop.

As of now, David is living with Elvis's family in their summer pasture, waiting for the skilled laborers to arrive. All construction materials are already in M and are being stored at the building site. Once the construction workers arrive tomorrow, they will begin tearing down the old adobe building and erecting a new brick shop. This will take 7-10 days depending on weather. M men have also offered to take time off of herding to help with building.

You might be wondering why only David returned to the village. The answer is a combination of practicality and the need to keep a low profile. In terms of practicality, finding transportation, food and lodging is much easier for one of us rather than the three of us. We did not want to burden Elvis's family since this visit would be much longer than the last one. Also, the summer pasture is a 45-minute motorcycle ride from the building site, and it would be difficult for all three of us to commute.

Because of the attention we drew last time we were in X county town, Mama S and T Fishy both advised that Pentok and our project would be safer if only one of us returned to M. We are much less conspicuous in Xining where there are many foreign teachers, students, and missionaries. We were disappointed when we realized two of us would have to stay behind, but decided that David should be the one to go back. As a male he will be safer traveling in the village, and since he can speak Chinese, he blends in with the locals much better than Jesse.

For the rest of our time in Xining, we will organize logistics for the project. We will buy a solar panel and tools for the shop, and with the help of the mechanic we will order enough motorcycle parts to start the shop. We will arrange for these to be in Xinghai county town when David and Elvis need them. We are also continuing to edit proposals and redesign the Pentok website. We have been working on various themes and layouts with our friend Scot from One Earth Designs, who was a computer science major at MIT.

We hope to have the project completed by August 10th and to leave Xining by August 15th. This will give us two more weeks in China before we are scheduled to return to the States. We hope to use this time for traveling, visiting Sara’s family in Beijing, and working on our final project report. However, our schedule was recently complicated by some good news. We (Sara and Jesse) will be starting work in Portland on September 1st, as part of a business research startup. It is an exciting opportunity, but we will miss David while he attends the Hopkins-Nanjing Center for graduate studies in international affairs. We have vowed to have weekly Skype conversations, even though he doesn’t know that yet!