weather

"Please Fasten Your Seatbelts."

October 24th marks the date for Art to be back on a plane to Chad, Africa. Tickets have been purchased, we just received the Chadian Visa this morning, reservations for housing has been made, more work on Galatians and Colossians are being done for this trip, etc. There is still much to be done, including making sure that his vaccinations are up to date. He’ll also be missing our presidential election in November, so he’ll need to vote early:)

When Art arrives in Chad, it’ll be the end of rainy season. Even though the rains do a decent job of lowering the temperature for the rest of the year, the rains also leave behind a lot of humidity for the next couple of months. But the countryside is pretty in October with everything green, the low mountains, and the fields of millet ripening. The towns are a different story. Also, the roads around Mongo will be more easy to travel now that things are drying up.

Some good news we also received recently is that a door of two weeks opened up for more of the book of Acts to be consultant checked in December! We are so thankful for this slot of time. It is probably not enough time to finish Acts, but it will come close. And hopefully Abdallah will be available for the back translation. He is the best person for this, but has been unavailable for the last couple of checkings.

Back in Chad

It has been a week now since Art arrived in Chad, and after visiting people in the capital, filling out paperwork for being in country, and another day of travel to the village, he was finally able to start some work with the translation team last Saturday. Since then (apart from Sunday) he has spent everyday going over several chapters of Acts with the team, and twice so far they were able to take the stories from Acts to different villages to test the accuracy of their translation. Today’s testings have been going well.

On a casual note, Art was able to visit several people last Sunday, and while he was visiting with some of these people, it rained! Being hot season still, the rain was so welcoming and brought the temps down a good 10F/5C degrees for a couple of days. Now it’s creeping back up to 110F/43.3C.

The Question Everyone asks: What Millet Should I Grow?

Two different kinds of Millet, Chad, AfricaNow that rainy season in gone, although the humidity still lingers, the first harvest is ready for the people of Chad.

There are two harvest seasons because of the different millet (the main food staple) that the people in central Chad grow: red millet, which handles a drier rainy season better, and white millet, which handles a wetter season better.

Of course if the season is perfect, both grow great. A friend of ours had it bad for a few years. One year, it was just plain dry and nothing wanted to grow. The following year, he planted more white millet than red assuming another bad year. Unfortunately for him, it rained too much and drowned almost his whole crop. So the next year he went after the red millet, and you can guess what happened. It was too dry, and the red millet died leaving his family with another very poor harvest.:(

seasons changing

Weather in Chad Africa, harvest timeOctober marks the end of rainy season in Chad. We have yet to find out how the crops will do as they finish ripening over the next couple of months. As I’ve mentioned months ago, rainy season had a fairly dry start this year, so many people didn’t lay seed down as early as desired. Tomorrow’s temperature in Chad’s capital will be 100F, and for the next couple of months, the temps will start to rise again, but this time, there is high humidity left over from the rains. This makes the last quarter of the year uncomfortably sweaty and sticky. One more reason to look forward to Christmas. That’s about the time when the best weather makes its way over Chad. If anyone is ever looking to visit Chad, between Christmas and Valentine’s Day is the time to go.

Rainy Season

Rainy season in Chad, AfricaBetter late than never. Rainy season is a very important time of year for everyone in Chad. So many people are sustenance farmers that if the rains don’t come, the people have nothing to eat for the next year. Millet, which is their main staple, is brought in from neighboring countries at very high prices which not many can afford enough of.
But thankfully we received news that August has brought some good rains. It’s over a month late, but it’s better late than never. Another thing to consider with this is if there will be enough rain at the end of the season to ripen the crop for harvest come November-January.

rainy season

It’s been rainy season for over a month now, but there has not been much rain to account for it. They have had a little shower here and there around the Dadjo villages, but they really need a good downpour to prepare the ground for sowing seed. Eventhough this kind of rain has not come yet, the people have started laying the seed anyway. If they wait any longer to plant, the millet will not have the chance to grow enough before the rains stop for the season. And yet, planting in the dryer soil could also be detrimental if some good thunderstorms are not soon in coming. Continue reading →

Chad Today

Today in Chad is hot for mid-May. Temperatures are forecast to reach 106F degrees today. Considering that they are 6 hours ahead of us here in Chicago, their day is already cooling off from the peak of the day. Ideally there is enough rains by this time to keep the temps closer to and under 100F. The rains are starting to turn the land a little green, but it is still a little while before people start planting in their fields. They want to make sure that the rains are consistent enough before laying the seeds down. Last year it did not rain very well in some areas leaving many short on food. But we also don’t want too much rain to come which can drown out the crops yielding little to no harvest for another season.