Début dramatique

Pierre, Bengt, Yngve and Christoffer

Je me suis réveillé à 3h00. Après une douche, de la bouillie et une prière du matin, mon fils Aron m’a amené à la maison de Bernt à Borås, où nous étions tous censés se rassembler. Hugo est venu avec un petit bus pour nous emmener à l’aéroport Landvetter de Göteborg. Mais Christoffer n’était pas venu au lieu de rassemblement. Bernt l’avait appelé, mais il n’avait pas répondu en personne, seulement sa messagerie vocale. Nous avons dû quitter Borås sans lui car nous devions être à Landvetter à 06.00. Bernt essayé de le joindre plusieurs fois sans succès. Christoffer avait disparu sans laisser de trace. Quand Aaron nous a quittés à Borås, il savait que nous n’avions pas mis la main sur lui. Retour à la maison, Aron et Kerstin a commencé le travail de trouver quelqu’un qui pourrait entrer en contact avec lui. Grâce à une note de papier dans la poubelle, et par l’intermédiaire de Facebook, ils ont réussi à retrouver le frère de Christoffer et lui, à son tour, a trouvé Christoffer endormi dans son lit. Christoffer fut réveillé tout à coup à 05:55. Avec grande hâte (la police n’a même pas eu la vitesse et les caméras n’ont pas l’attraper avant qu’ils ne soient déjà passé), Christoffer est arrivé au check-in à l’aéroport deux minutes avant qu’ il aurait fermé. Bon travail d’enquête et un transport rapide avait résolu l’obstacle de trop dormir. Christoffer avait mis son réveil pour se réveiller au bon moment, mais il l’avait éteint dans son sommeil. Vous devez être particulièrement attention à ne pas éteindre l’alarme dans votre sommeil quand vous pouvez manquer un voyage au Congo. Enfin, nous étions tous ensemble dans l’avion et tout allait bien.

J’écris ces lignes à Bruxelles, où nous avons une attente de deux heures pour que l’avion Kinshasa. Quand je regarde autour, je constate que nos compagnons sont de plus en plus sombre. Maintenant, nous devons nous habituer à être dans la minorité.

Le voyage de 7.5 heures à Kinshasa s’est déroulé selon le calendrier. Une conduite très confortable avec des rafraîchissements, du café et de la nourriture à intervalles réguliers. Nous avons utilisé le temps de sommeil, les discussions et la lecture. A notre grande surprise, la température n’est-ce pas élevé maintenant à Kinshasa, autour de 25 degrés Celsius, confortable pour un homme du Nord. Pierre et Yapeco est venu nous chercher à l’aéroport dans la voiture de police et nous ont emmenés à Nzo Binati. Avant de nous sommes allées dans nos chambres, Yapeco dit une prière pour la protection de Dieu et la bénédiction sur nos semaines au Congo. Une bonne et populaire tradition congolaise. Le couple Håkanson Bygård a été attribué une chambre et le reste d’entre nous, y compris Yapeco eu à partager une autre pièce.Yapeco et Ing-Marie sortit pour acheter de la nourriture et Michel, l’un des membres du personnel ici à Nzo Binati, a fait cuire le dîner pour nous. Poulet grillé et du pain avec de l’eau ou de Coca-Cola.

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Jour d’avant

Demain vendredi, nous partons au Congo Kinshasa. Nous avons travaillé avec des préparations pour quelques mois, plus oú moins. Les dernières semaines ont été plus intenseet maintenant, nos valises sont prêtes. Franchise de bagages est de deux valises de 23 kg chacune max, en plus de bagage de cabine. Nous sommes cinq personnes qui voyagent. Bengt & Ing-Marie Bygård Håkanson nous accompagnent, la plupart du temps en tant que touristes. Ils restent avec nous pour deux semaines, puis ils vont continuer à Brazzaville et quelques autres endroits dans le pays. Christopher Jacobsson s’engagera dans d’enseigner le judo aux jeunes à Luozi. Il existe déjà un groupe de judo dans l’église Mawanda. Christoffer restera probablement à Luozi toutes les quatre semaines. Nous avons soigneusement vérifié avec le top management de l’Eglise CEC sur cette activité spécifique. Bernt Sköld et moi, nous allons être engagé dans les activités des entrepreneurs. Voir notre itinéraire sous «À propos». Lennart Friden et Lars-Ola Rydberg se joindront à nous dans deux semaines à partir de maintenant, et ils vont rester à Matadi. Ils seront principalement travailler avec les suivis des travaux des entrepreneurs.

Tout semble avoir trouvé sa place et nous sont bien préparés pour le voyage. Ce matin, j’ai parlé avec Yapeco Bakala et Nsimba Andersson et moi ont eu un chat en ligne. La situation semble être sous contrôle.

J’espère y retourner tous les jours avec de nouveaux rapports du Congo afin que vous qui lisez notre blog peut suivre nos activités. Les traductions en anglais et français peut prendre un certain temps, mais soyez patient, ils viendront. À bientôt à nouveau.

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Entrepreneurs in the pipeline

Dialendua in his shop for shoes and clothes

Here you can see pictures of the activities January 11 team works with. It’s about coffee shop and food service, sales of shoes and clothing. Food business, wholesale business of meat and fish, pharmacy and car sales. They received their training in January 2011 and February 2012 and received their loan March 10  2012. They borrowed a total of $ 38 900 and will begin their repayment on 30 August. Yapeco has taken the pictures.

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The first container is packed

Packing the container

Since May, Bernt worked hard with the collection of used items to the Congo. Most work Bernt has had to sort out and collect the tires. Over 350 Used but approved for use in Sweden was now in stock at Olsfors. Not approved can not be exported.

We use the Mission Covenant Church depot in Olsfors to store our collected material, and we packed the container even there, a very good place to store and pack on.

At 8 o’clock on Tuesday July 17, the container came. At 9 o’clock, we started packing. Bernt had learned to braid tires to minimize the export of air. In the spaces we packed clothes but unfortunately we had not enough clothes to fill all the voids. We hope to have more clothes to the next container to use all the spaces. We found out that it is best to pack clothes in the ordinary carrier bags, the pack fits well with the tires, but it is also possible to pack in boxes, they’re better protected that way.

There were over 200 packages of clothing, computers, bikes, television sets, radios,  typewriters, beds, plus various other things and 257 tires could we pack.
Thursday July 19 the container goes to Gothenburg for shipment to Matadi.

Our colleagues in Matadi will sell what we are exporting. The gain of this sales will be split 50/50 between our co-workers and Matadi Support Group. MSG will use its share to cover costs we have in the Congo.

We are now focusing on the next container. Read our list of matching items to the Congo. Go into the « Entrepreneurs » and « New Project » and « Export Congo »

 

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Report Nsanda Group activities

Pili-pili

Nsanda group is an organization, a collective, with nine members. From the beginning the group consisted of 13 members, but 4 is not active any more. Those who are left in the organization are supporting by their stakes and contributions, or come and work in the field. As I write this report, was a member here for two days but have to go back because of work.

The cultures

2011 we ploughed up eight hectares for cassava. In addition, we planted the peanuts in the cassava on 5 hectares and soy beans on 3 hectares.

Unfortunately, we were hit by severe drought and many provinces of the Congo and destroyed much of our culture. As the harvest was not what was expected. Of the peanuts we got 900 kg instead of 10 tons which was expected, soy dried up completely and did nothing. Manioc will be harvested at the end of this year. It has done well and hopefully will give a good harvest.

We have taken up new ground, about 2 hectares, and planted one hectare of beans and one hectare pili-pili. The beans we harvest now, the result was not as expected, because the rain that came in April –  May did not provide enough moisture, but we will reap a little more than seed. Pili-pili bloom well and is already providing fruit, it will begin shipping in late August month. By the pili-pili, and manioc, we will return the loan.

Project effect

Nsanda groups pursuits are too many families here as a gift from God. It helps more than eight families. Nsanda Group have given work almost every day for many of them from September 2011 until now. According to their testimony, they have received compensation for each working day to pay for medical care, food, school fees, buying plate, rent and debts. They want to Nsanda Group’s business is growing into an industry. Nsanda group called now for « industries ».

Difficulties

We meet a number of difficulties in our work on climate change that reduces all production and affect work planning.

We hope to get a solution to our water pump which is located here.

All in Nsanda group is not active, it’s mostly family Nyambudi who work hard, most people live so far away so that they can not come here to work. We believe in more commitment to the family farm than to have this organization.

Soon, we need a warehouse for all harvest, but we lack a local, I´m thinking of manioc.

We have a shortage of agricultural machinery in order to reduce the manual work.

Planning for next season

We will continue to take up 10 hectares of new land before the next rainy season which begins in October. We plan to split it as follows:

2 hectares bananas

3 hectares to lease out to our employees

4 hectares of cassava mixed with pili-pili, beans and sesame.

1 hectares bee cultivation.

We thank Matadi Support Group for supporting us and we promise to pursue their principles.

Regards

Julienne Kukangisa

Nsanda group.

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Exporter vers le Congo

For some months we have collected used items for export to Congo. Bernt has taken responsibility for this activity. He has now been collecting almost everything to a 20 feet container. It will be packed on July 17 and 18 . Do you have anything suitable to send so please contact Bernt or any of us. In the « New Project » and « Export Congo » has a list of things that fit to send to the Congo. Or, click here.

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News from Nsanda

The workers, Yapeco. Julienne and Yngve in Nsanda

Sending a greeting from Nsanda Group before Clément and I go to Kinshasa tomorrow to Masuku´s funeral. He passed away on Sunday at 9:30pm in Kinshasa. Masuku was married to Maurice Ekaba which is one of Nsanda Group members. She usually comes to Nsanda to be with us for a while. She and her husband came in last month but had to cancel the stay because of her husband’s illness. The funeral will be on Saturday in Kinshasa.

It is so wonderful now, with rain falling almost every day, it’s just a shame that it costs a lot of money to go otherwise it would be interesting for you to come now to experience the new life with our farms. We have even tasted our sakasaka and you may believe that it was so good.

We have already counted on to plow 10 new hectares. Land preparation will be done as soon as I receive information from you that money is sent. The workers here have no patience, they want to be paid as soon as possible after work.

How we intend to use the new land: 2 hectares of banana plantation, 5 hectares of cassava and the gaps are mixed, for example, with peas, almonds, water melon. 2 ha, we lease out and 1 ha should we give to our drivers as salery.

That is how my husband and I have thought, have you any advice or suggestions to give, we are grateful. (Send a mail to Julienne address  julienne@matadi.hakanson.se )

We hope that Yapeco comes with a chain saw when he comes back to Matadi because it can be very helpful for Nsanda group and also to our family.

We travel back as soon as possible to Nsanda to continue our work here with the farms.

Kindest regards

Julienne and Jean-Clément

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Sowing and harvesting in Nsanda

Julienne and her workers at Nsanda

First of all, I wish you a happy Easter and may this weekend be a great celebration both to your respective families and to all MSG’s friends here and around the world.

It goes well with us here in Nsanda and the agriculture. Mrs. Masuku Melanie was traveling back to Kinshasa unexpected because her husband has fallen ill. He has trouble with high blood pressure, high blood sugar levels. Now he is in hospital in Kinshasa, we hope he will be fine again but right now he is unconscious.

The plants are growing very well and we have got back heavy rain now, it’s just a shame I can not send pictures because my camera is broken. Today we finished the replanting of 2.5 hectares cassava that were most affected by drought. Peanuts look good and healthy, we’ll see what we will get in crop. We wait a bit with the beans until the rain has fallen. They can not tolerate lots of rain. PiriPiri we will so in two weeks.

We begin to prepare new ground next week if I get money from the members in our group, since the workforce wants money once they have finished working. I called Joyce yesterday but I got no answers about who has paid their debt to Nsanda projects.

Nsanda fund has only $ 450 today. It will not cover all costs now because we need money for labour forces to sow beans and piri piri, harvest the peanuts at the end of April or early May, and buy storage bags.

Greetings Julienne

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