School Bathroom Nightmare, Part II

Once the 550 bricks, 200 kilos of cement, 175 kilos of steel and everything else we needed were safely in one of the classrooms, the drama began. The association president was upset that we didn't take anyone with us from the association when we bought the stuff. The vice president of the association was upset at our choice of a foreman, other random men showed up who hadn't been at our previous meetings demanding to know why they weren't picked to be the foreman, and everyone was upset that we'd agreed to a daily wage rate that was $3.50 higher than the current going rate for a foreman. We debated for hours, Jed and I saying that we'd been clear from the beginning that we needed a foreman, that if people didn't come to the meetings when they were invited, they can't complain about not being selected as foreman. The association members (for some reason I'm sure I still don't fully understand) were adamant that we not use the foreman we chose. The president claimed that the toilets were so simple to build that we didn't need a foreman, so everyone would work for free. We agreed to this, skeptical but tired of fighting. After two days, they changed their minds and decided they needed a foreman, but couldn't agree on whom, only that it not be the one we'd hired. The guy we hired gave up on us and went back to Midelt to find real work, and the association decided on three different foreman - one would be in charge of the foundation, one the building, and one the roof. This worked until the wall guy decided he had better things to do and quit. Then the association hired a guy I'd never even seen before to be the foreman for the whole rest of the project. Jed and I just wanted to see the thing built, and Ramadan was only a couple of days away, so we agreed.