Hello from Lesotho! Or rather Lumelang (pronounced Dumelang)
I arrived safe and sound on the 28th of October. It only took an 8 hour flight, 8 hour layover, 11 hour flight and 5 hour drive to get to Hlotse in Leribe, Lesotho. Oh that reminds me, if you are going to mail me anything, please put Southern Africa after Lesotho – apparently NO ONE knows where this place is. All the harder to track me down I suppose. You know, I’m sure there are people after me for something.
As usual, I had a little bit of a hard time getting here. Just checking in in Toronto they tried to tell me I couldn’t fly to South Africa without a visa as my ticket was for more than 90 days and I had no proof I was leaving the country – telling them a man was picking me up at the airport to take me to Lesotho wasn’t enough (which I totally get). They also tried to tell me I need my yellow fever vaccine card, which makes zero sense as you only need if you are flying through a country with a yellow fever issue – London, England, as far as I know, does not have such an issue. They ended up getting the word from some guy who knows these things and poof, all my problems disappeared. They did overlook the fact that one of my bags was 7kg overweight so I guess you win some and you lose some and life goes on.
I’m settling into my new home. A small house with 2 bedrooms – one for me and one for Tara (the other intern) – a kitchen, sitting room and washroom – complete with a toilet and hot shower. Yes I have running water, which to drink I have to boil first.
Anyone know how long I have to boil it before it’s safe to drink?
The house is located on the same property as the Help Lesotho office so it’s not a far walk. However, I should be moving into the new centre upon its completion…now projected to be sometime around Christmas. This past August was too ambitious a goal it would seem.
This entry is too long so I’ll leave it there. I hope to have regular internet access during the week but I am not sure how often I’ll get to use it for personal emails. There are quite a few of us in the office sharing a slow dial up connection.
Sala Hantle
According to the interwebs (always oh-so-reliable with their facts), you only have to boil water until it's a good rolling boil (http://www.survivaltopics.com/survival/the-best-way-to-make-water-safe-to-drink/). Once you've got that, it's safe. I did read some other stuff that said 5 minutes or 10 minutes, but 10 minutes seems excessive to me.
ReplyDeleteFrom what I have been trained with at MEC I agree with Liz. Once the water hits a roiling boil it will have killed everything; so to continue boiling for 5-10 mins is only a waste of fuel/electricity.
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