Tuesday, July 18 - Word Collection Day 7

Today was a very positive day in many ways. I was glad to have a number of genuine positive things to say to the group in our meeting to start the day off. So I had the group applauding their progress on multiple occasions. Since they were within feasible striking distance of the “magical” number of 10,000, I challenged them to work hard today to try to attain that number by the end of the day. (They don’t know it yet, but they fell just short of that goal, ending the day with 9,931 words collected. That’s still a very good result for the day, so I’ll be able to encourage them with the news in the morning.)

There are still a couple of groups that are struggling in their ability to understand the French of the questionnaire or to apply the principles that were taught during the training phase, so Matthieu and Justin felt that two of the typists would be of more help overall if they sat in on the groups that need some help rather than doing data entry. Matthieu and Justin are going over all of the data prior to it being entered into the database, in order to weed out incorrect information and add obvious items that the word-collection groups overlooked. This is great for quality control, but unfortunately, it means that the backlog of data to be entered is increasing. We might be able to finish entering the words that were collected yesterday by the end of the workday tomorrow.

Matthieu checking words before they get entered into the database

Justin checking words

Today there was a special treat for everyone: boiled corn. Apparently the ears are thrown into a pot of boiling water, husks and all. Then each person husks his own and enjoys eating it. It’s quite similar to sweet corn back home but not as sweet, and there is no butter and salt to put on it. I enjoyed my ear very much.

enjoying boiled corn

I am still in very good health, something I do not at all take for granted. I am well-fed, actually eating more than I need (yet not nearly as much as my African companions at the table). I began cutting back on my portion size because I’m not very hungry for most meals, but I think my hosts are interpreting that as lack of interest in the food being provided for me. This is a constant dilemma in the African context, given how little food my body really needs.

I had an interesting experience when I returned to my room after lunch today. I had only a few minutes to spend there before it was time to wait at the gate for my ride to the church, but as I entered, there was a small bird (a female Firefinch) flying around my room! Long story short, I finally trapped it in the 3-inch space between the glass and the screen of my bathroom window. Then I found one of my Catholic hosts and asked him what to do about it. He came, and while he was trying to catch it, the bird went out through a hole in the bottom of the screen of that window that neither of us had noticed up to that point. Problem solved!

Monday, July 17 - Word Collection Day 6

First of all, a note about what happened on Sunday. It turns out the Moïse did come to pick me up that morning, but he couldn’t find me. He wasn’t aware that I had been moved to a different room, and he didn’t have my phone number in order to contact me that way. So we missed each other. All mysteries regarding what happened that day are now solved.

As far as what happened today, we began the day with a meeting of the entire group, as usual. I announced that we were on track to exceed their goal of 13,000 words by the end of this week, since we had already collected more than 7,000 in the first five days of the workshop. They were greatly encouraged by this news, and there was a round of celebration. Matthieu and I went on, however, to point out a couple examples of ways in which some of the groups had gone astray, using up precious time writing down phrases in the language that do not belong in a  dictionary. We encouraged the group leaders to keep in mind the principles that had been taught during the training period, so that the typists would not have to cross out or correct so much of the data that was submitted to them.

The mood as we broke up to begin collecting words again was a bit subdued because of the correction that Matthieu and I felt was necessary to bring, but the results seem to have been worth the time and effort we invested during that meeting. Matthieu told me at the end of the day today that the quality of the data collected today was much improved compared to Friday’s, meaning that his job of checking the content was taking much less time. This allowed him to keep me supplied with material to enter into the database.

We added nearly 1400 words today, including those added by the typists to domains that had been treated less than thoroughly on Friday by the word-collection groups. This gives us a 6-day total of 8,437 words collected. Perhaps more important is the fact that the groups moved more quickly through the domains they worked on today; we’ve now treated nearly 1000 of the 1800 domains. That means that we’re still off the pace necessary in order to get through all of the domains by the end of the week, but we’re getting closer to being able to achieve that goal.

I’m looking forward to being able to share undiluted good news at our group meeting tomorrow morning: good progress on the word count, improved prognosis regarding our ability to get through all of the domains by the end of the week, and much-improved quality in the data collected. I think this will give everyone a boost, offsetting some of the fatigue from this marathon of intellectual effort that is definitely making itself felt at this point.

That’s not all the good news for the day, though. We got Matthieu’s computer configured to be able to submit data to the online dictionary site, so if you want to have a peek at the data we’re collecting, check out http://djimini.webonary.org. Just keep in mind that this data is very, very raw and will require a lot of cleaning up. I’ll be helping the team get started on that task next week before I leave to return home.

We also—with a bit of help via email from a colleague in Dallas to solve a problem we encountered along the way—got Matthieu’s computer set up to submit data to a website that will allow me (and other individuals who will be helping with this dictionary from somewhere other than Dabakala) to download the data from the team and upload contributions as necessary.

All in all, today was a very positive day in a number of ways.

Sunday, July 16 - On my own

Despite the best intentions of the Baptist leaders who invited me here, and of the Catholic priests who are responsible for my room and board, I ended up on my own for much of the day today. Matthieu was in another village for the funeral of a Christian woman, and there is no cell phone service there. He had asked Moïse to pick me up and take me to church this morning, but I was in the dark about this arrangement. I texted Matthieu on Saturday evening to ask what was planned for Sunday morning but received no response since he had no cell service where he was. No one showed up at the Catholic center by 8:45 this morning, so I walked to the local church and participated in the service there.

After the service, I came back to my room and waited for lunchtime to roll around. At 12:30—the time we normally eat the midday meal during the week—I went to the dining room, but no one was there. I waited around for a while, but no one showed up. Thinking that the schedule might be different on Sunday, I went back to my room for a while and returned to the dining room around 1:15. Still no one, but I did notice that there were leftovers on the side table that looked like they were intended for our midday meal. I sat and read a book for a while, but when no one had turned up by 2:05, I decided I’d be skipping lunch today. You see, as a guest here, I’ve not been expected—or even allowed—to do a number of things. Among these is the heating up of leftover food. I could have heated up some of the food that was on the side table and eaten it, but I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to do, and I didn’t know the “house rules” for heating up leftovers. So I skipped lunch. Well, not completely. I have some snacks in my room, and I dipped into them to hold me over.

The situation began to become clearer around 5:00, when I got a phone call from Matthieu. He had just returned from the funeral and finally got my text message from last evening. It was in that phone call that I learned that Moïse was supposed to have picked me up and taken me with him to church this morning. However, Matthieu also informed me that one of Moïse’s neighbors, an elderly woman, had just died last evening, and that must be the reason that he didn’t come to get me.

A couple of hours later, at the evening meal, I learned that my hosts, the priests, had been invited out to a parishioner’s home for lunch, so I was on my own. That was why no one had shown up to join me. In both cases I was in the dark about what the others had planned for me. It felt rather strange to be so alone here, but I used some of the time in the afternoon to pray and reflect on the sermon I had heard. Plus, I got a lot of rest, so I should be ready to go tomorrow morning.

Saturday, July 15 - R & R

Well, my hair’s not bushy anymore! I went to a local barber this afternoon and told him I needed it trimmed around my ears and across the back. He did that, and then some, as you can see in the photos below. Actually, I think he did a pretty good job, especially considering that I was probably the first white man whose hair he had ever cut. And the price was right—50 cents, to which I added a 30% tip.

Much of my day today was spent reading, working puzzles, and attending to personal work on my computer. I also walked to the market and bought a few things that members of my family asked me to get for them. Not much to report on after a day of so much rest and relaxation.

Friday, July 14 - Word Collection Day 5

I was able to encourage the participants this morning about their work on Thursday, and they set off to begin word collection in good spirits. They made good headway again today, finishing the week with just over 7,000 words collected.

On a more discouraging note, it seems that there are some problems with a few of the groups. One group is zipping through the semantic domains so quickly that they are missing a lot of obvious words. The typists then have to take the time to add these words to the lists themselves before actually typing them, which slows down their part of the work. Two other groups spent a lot of time writing down phrases that are not useful and which had to be crossed out. I’ll be giving a bit of an explanation again on Monday morning about the difference between idiomatic expressions (which should be included in a dictionary) and descriptive phrases (which have no place in a dictionary). The silver lining on this “cloud” is, of course, the fact that we’re collecting so much valid material for the dictionary in spite of the problems.

I continue to function as a typist, helping as much as I can. Everything I type has to be checked beforehand by Matthieu, however, and he only has so many hours in the day. There is quite a backlog of material waiting to be typed, and at this point, it’s looking like we’ll be dealing with that during the cleanup week instead of being able to focus on cleaning up the data that we’ve collected. But maybe we’ll be able to complete it the first couple of days that week and still have some time for me to teach those who will be continuing work on the dictionary about how to do that.

On the “home” front, I enjoyed a hot shower again this morning and got my laundry done during the day while I was gone. Tomorrow I hope to be able to get my hair trimmed, as it’s getting rather bushy around my ears and on the back of my neck.

Thursday, July 13 - Word Collection Day 4

Today was a day of surprises, most of which were unrelated to the word-collection workshop, so I’ll get to them in a moment.

I gave a pep talk in our group meeting this morning, urging the participants to increase their pace to get through all of the semantic domains in two weeks. I showed them numbers from the first three days, indicating that Day 2 and 3's totals were not like Day 1. They got the picture and went to work with renewed energy and enthusiasm, and I sensed throughout the day that we were doing better again.

When I did the final tally, I saw that today’s output was back up to Tuesday’s level which was quite good, but we may not get through all of the material in the ten days. I’ll keep trying to encourage them to move more quickly, all the while keeping the report on what they have accomplished very positive. The total for the first four days is 5,721, which is very good. We will almost certainly end up with more than 10,000 words. Whether we’ll reach the group’s goal of 13,000 or not remains to be seen.

My first surprise of the day came when I got set up to shave this morning. The city water is often off and I have to shave from a cup and shower from a bucket, but this morning it was on, and as I ran water from the tap, it came out warm! (I have not had warm water here at all since I left Abidjan nearly two weeks ago.) In the shower, hot water come out of the showerhead!!! I can't explain it; there was never anything other than cold water from the tap or shower in my previous room. I don’t know if it will ever happen again while I’m here, but I enjoyed it this one time even if I never experience it again. This evening, as I washed the sweat off before crawling into bed, the city water was off again, so it was a cold bucket bath that I experienced.

The next surprise came as I was leaving my room for breakfast. I saw that the lawnmowing crew had arrived and was busily at work in the courtyard outside my room. (I took a picture, which I will share with you here.) Sheep, goats, and chickens roam freely here, and this group of sheep decided that this was where they were having their breakfast today.

The quiet lawnmowing crew

The third surprise of the day came about an hour after the groups began collecting words this morning. The electricity went off. That’s not too surprising, considering where I am. However, electricity gets cut here less frequently than the city water, and when it does, it usually comes back on within 30 minutes. This time, however, it stayed off. That was the surprising part.

Computers began running out of battery power, so Matthieu began looking into getting the generator that they were counting on as a backup. To his dismay, he learned that the person who owned it was out of town for a wedding, this being a Thursday in the “season” for weddings. So the generator was unavailable.

Being unable to continue typing words into the database because his computer had run out of battery power, Matthieu set about correcting the words on the sheets of paper, then passing them to me to type, since my computer battery was still in good shape. I was kept busy all morning in this way, doing data entry in addition to the record-keeping that is my normal task. The power came back on about 12:30, but Matthieu did no more data entry the rest of the day, preferring to spend his time correcting spelling and translation errors and passing sheets to me to enter into the database. By the end of the day, I was exhausted from the frenetic pace I had kept up almost all day long.

Wednesday, July 12 - Word Collection Day 3

We have collected a total of 4,187 words through the first three days of our workshop. That’s a very good start, putting us right on track to reach the group-appointed goal of 13,000 words by the end of next week! However, I am concerned about the significant downward trend in productivity from Monday to Tuesday and again from Tuesday to Wednesday.

The pace slowed significantly today as groups tackled semantic domains that were less productive than those they had dealt with previously. Unfortunately, some of the groups spent more time than they should have trying to find more words in these more-challenging domains. Tomorrow morning I’ll have to give them a pep talk to pick up the pace. Reaching the goal of 13,000 words is still quite possible, but we’ll need to find a way to turn the trend around.

My role during the two weeks of word collection is primarily record-keeping. However, I’ve volunteered to help with data entry if someone who knows the language checks the words and their translations first so that I’m not entering some unclear wording that the editors will need to spend much time on later. Matthieu took me up on my offer to a limited extent yesterday and to a much greater extent today. (That “Personal Use Typing” course I took in high school continues to pay high dividends, enabling me to type even an African language I don’t speak or understand, keeping my eyes on the paper where the words are written and not looking at the keyboard.)

Djimini typists

I’m glad to be able to contribute, but we are lagging behind in the data-entry part of the work flow. This is due primarily to the fact that both the scribes and the translators are making errors, requiring the typists to have to get clarification from them prior to typing the words into the database. We may end up typing on the weekend in order to catch up.

On a personal note, I am sleeping well, eating well, and feeling well, all of which I’m very happy about.