The first day working on the site is not the most glamorous. It's the day where we organize and plan, we gather the materials, and semi-confusion rules for the first few hours. We were discussing the plans for the day until nearly 11:30 when the materials finally arrived. As soon as the van pulled up, we all rushed to help unload. We soon found a problem with the lumber. Some of the boards were too wide for our plans and because they were custom cut for the job, we couldn't send them back. So we had to revise our original plans to compensate for the different dimensions. Just one more hurdle to overcome!
Dad and I were appointed with the task of putting the wooden plate around the foundation. I helped Dad with this the last time we were in Campo Grande, Brazil. So we were both familiar with the responsibility. I won't bore you with specific details of what has to be done, but basically there is a wooden plate that is screwed to the foundation walls. On this plate the walls, trusses, basically everything attaches to and rest on this wooden plate. So it is a semi-thankless job, but an integral...perhaps even the most important job that must be done.
We selected our wood for the plate and then started to gave it to the staining team to prepare. Meanwhile we measured, and prepared the foundation. It seems like an easy job but when the foundation walls are curved and sometimes not level, it's important to correct those things as much as possible.
Before we know it, it's lunch time! Which is one of my FAVORITE times of day. It's a time to gorge myself on authentic, homemade Brazilian food! YUMMMMMY!! For our first meal we had 'estrogonofe' which is a Brazilian stew. Today's selection was 'frango' or chicken! Accompanied by a cooked piece of carne (beef) with onions on top! We also had arroz (rice) along with boiled potatoes, beets, and what I call sawdust (which i can't remember the correct name) but it's SOOOO GOOD! And we had watermelon for dessert! Everything was DELICIOUS!
After lunch we were all renewed and ready to go back to work! At the end of the day to look around the site, not much had changed. Still we had much of the staining done and 1/4 of the plate was installed. For a first day of work, I think we accomplished a great amount and were able to prepare many of the pieces of the puzzle!
Most importantly, at the end of the day, our hosts were gracious enough to offer us a light dinner of hotdogs with a tomato based sauce with corn and some soft drinks! Light and delicious! More food and progress reports tomorrow!
1 comment:
You sound like that was a straight quote from dad... "tedious job, but perhaps the most important."... "Ian, many times the preparation is more important than the actual doing of the task." haha... Food looks delish... Call your lonely sister sometime who's stuck in the states working... Love you!
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