Bzzzzz-ZAP!

Rain is glorious. I love the feeling of rain. I love the smell of rain. And most importantly, it means that farmers here might even see a harvest this year. But rain can also cause all manner of problems at school. First off, my voice is mostly gone because raindrops falling on a corrugated iron roof make a lot of noise. My efforts to explain the unit circle required a lot of shouting to be heard.

Second, my third year students are still in that mud shack which means that a little stream flows right through the classroom. I had an elaborate analogy about cooking beans to explain the Haber Process (the industrial method for preparing ammonia), but the students were pretty distracted as I had to jump over the stream to get to the blackboard to write notes and then jump back over the stream to get close enough to them so that they could hear me over the sound of the rain hitting the roof.

Third, there is a large transformer next to the school that gave the title of this post. There was no lightning in the storm, but the heavy rainfall caused something to go haywire. I was sitting in the staff room when I heard a buzzing and a very loud pop. Chaos ensued. All of the first and second year students were bolting for the gate to the school compound. There is no such thing as a fire drill in my village, so it was panic and free-for all. They threw desks across the room and I was amazed that no one was hurt.

I went to see what they were looking at and heard the transformer buzzing and sputtering and giving off a brilliant light, but I didn't see any immediate danger. I ran over to the gate at the opposite end of the compound to corral the students. I was mostly concerned about them standing out in the rain and catching a cold, but I also wanted to assuage their fears. Some of the other students told me later that they thought that I was fleeing in panic like the others. After a five minute delay, the students came back to class and everyone settled down.

Since the second years are the most skittish, I gave them a talk on how they need to handle themselves in an emergency (remain calm, remain calm and REMAIN CALM). Then I realized how foolish they had been. In the classroom, there was virtually no risk. They opted to run to the gate which connects to a chain link fence that runs the perimeter of the compound. I explained that if the wire had come into contact with the fence on the opposite side of the compound they would have been in a much more dangerous position. I'm just glad that no one was hurt.

Fourth, I had to subtract another one of my accomplishments today. I was so proud that the school had agreed to put up gutters so that they could collect rainwater from the roof and harvest it in a tank. Even though they were only at 10% coverage, I figured the success of that area would be a good demonstration and encourage them to expand the project. Today I studied the system in action. It turns out that the tank leaks. And the pipe to get water out of the tank doesn't work. And the pipe to feed the water into the tank wasn't actually feeding it into the tank so much as to the top of the tank where it would flow off. So instead of increasing the school's quantity of water, this project has probably increased surface run-off (basically erosion) and nothing else. Goes to show the importance of following up and evaluating projects. I know what I need to start working on tomorrow.

Still, I got lots of laughs from my students as I ran around in the rain and I love being soaked to the skin.