Saturday March 9, Walk to Market, Wedding and Buying Pump.

Saturday March 8, 2014


Saturday, I woke up at 3 AM when the power came on and noticed that the internet was running. It has been trouble during the weekday. I had several emails that I had tried to send but had failed many times. So I got up and sent out emails and Face Book messages and posted some pictures on Face Book. I got back to bed before sun up and slept in until after 9 AM.

Late morning I started to walked to the main Market to buy some parboiled rice (about a mile one way). Yakubu Market had wanted 1200 Naira ($7.12) for a 2 pound bag of Uncle Ben's. I was not willing to pay that much.

A wedding had completed at the Cathedral and the reception party was underway on the compound next to the Cathedral. The house I live in while I visit here is in the North East corner of the compound. The Deaf Centre is in the North West corner. Most weekends in March, April and May they will have a wedding reception on the compound. Last year we had three on the same Saturday.


I stopped at the wedding and took a couple pictures. The wedding was well attended. The groom is a doctor. I climbed up the spiral staircase to the balcony exit of the Cathedral to get good view. The wedding always publishes the color theme. Women will find matching fabric and will make dresses and head scarves to attend the wedding. I noticed a lot of women had the same pink and grey fabric made into a variety of dress styles. Then I spotted a three men chatting up some ladies with trousers and matching ties made of the same material. I asked one of the men to strike a pose

Click to enlarge

I headed on up the main road to the Jimeta Main Market. It is about a mile walk. Along the way I saw a man with a pull cart hauling a heavy bed. These movers earn little money for hard work. The picture does not show it but the street is a slight upward incline. The man was moving faster than I was walking. There a quite a few of these going along with and sometimes against traffic. Boys also push loads in wheelbarrows. There are boys throughout the market waiting for someone to buy something they need taken out to their cars or back to their homes.

Route to Market

At the market, I walked up and down up and down several rows of stalls before I found a man selling rice by the measure. Most had 5 kilo or 50 kilogram bags. He wants 600 Naira for the small measure of what he called parboiled, but the bag it was in did not say parboiled.. This is more than I was willing to pay. He told me 500 and that I would not find it any cheaper at any other shop. I continued on through several more rows of shops. I noticed shop with large container of what I thought might be dried mushrooms. I continued on and did not find much. Lot of shops with about anything you could need. Mostly made in China, Nigeria or England.

One of many aisles of shops.

I circled back to where I saw what looked like mushrooms and noticed he had rice in a bag labeled parboiled from Thailand. I asked him the price and he said 350 Naira for the small measure. I agreed and I got about 3 pound for $2.07. I have not yet boiled any to see what it taste like. I looked around his shop and purchased salt, dried peppers, flavored drink mixes, tomato paste in small packets and a few other things. The dried mushroom turned out to be sliced dried ginger. I bought a 30 Naira bag ($0.18).  I hope I remember where he was located he was a nice young man.

Items outside of one of the tiny shops

Closer view of main market.

The main market was under construction when I first came to Nigeria in 2006. I am told that the first contractor took a lot of money and disappeared. The second contractor was not a lot better. I believe it was open on my 2010 trip. Each of the little metal buildings have shops on both sides. Each shop is about 3 meters deep (10 feet). The smallest shops are only 3m X 3m. The biggest I saw was probably 3m X 9m. Most have their merchandise extended out past the curb and into the traffic area. These small aisles can be maneuvered by boys with wheelbarrows. There are a few wide aisle where car can move through. The storm drains were poorly constructed and many covers have collapsed. Besides shops there are money exchanges and restaurants. On the west end is an open meat market. I have pictures of it in previous blogs.

Later in the evening I walked up to the Plumbing pipe market area. It is only about 1/2 mile south of the Cathedral on Hospital Road and met Bulama to pick up the pipes, rods and pumps we will need Monday to finish the work at Garaha Larh. The materials originally ordered for this project was the wrong type of pump. He said he had the correct material and all was new. We are going to install an India Mark III pump. Their other pump is a Mark III. This pump is considered a Village Level Operator Maintenance (VLOM) pump. The main parts that need to be replaced in hand pumps are worn out seals on the pump piston. A VLOM pump can have its piston removed without removing the riser pipes. The main pump used here is the India Mark II which is not VLOM. It has 1-1/4 inch steel riser pipes. The rise pipes filled with water have to be lifted out of the borehole. This is a complicated and somewhat dangerous operation. It takes skilled pump mechanics.

The India Mark III uses 2-1/2 inch PVC pipes. The ones recommended by the Nigerian Government have stainless steel screw on fittings. Only used screw on PVC pipes are available in Yola. They are manufactured in Lagos so they should be available there. The piston is about 2 inches in diameter. After removing the pump head and disconnection the operating chain from the operating rods the piston can be removed by lifting out the operating rods. The 3 to 4 hour task on a Mark II is less than an hour on a Mark III and few tools are needed. There is another pump called the Afridev that uses the same riser pipes but they made every bolt the pump the same size. It is even easier to change the seals. We are exploring the options to have these pumps available in Yola.

After getting the piston to the house/office I inspected the piston and found it to be used also. I will bring along all the repair parts and have the Water Committee Chairman in the village replace the parts. We will also be training him on how to perform weekly checks of the pump.