Can you help?

Dear Friends and Family,

I have good news! It's May 1 and the power hasn't cut for a couple of days. Yay!

A year ago, this might not have been as exciting news. This time of year typically has more consistent power. Usually, sadly, it is the very HOTTEST part of the year (August - November) when the power cuts the most. But this year, my statement actually IS good news...

... which makes my statement bad news...

This year we haven't had much relief from power cuts the entire year. While they were longer and more prevalent in those hot months, they have persisted to interrupt our lives on a weekly, if not daily basis. That, combined with the fact that our "cold" season has been a good 10 degrees hotter than our last few, has made some of the circumstances of our living situation a little bit more difficult this year.

It seems like the greatest toll is on our mental health. In school, a power cut means that the Powerpoint Mindee created for her writing class will go unseen. It means my Yearbook class will have one less day to make their deadlines. It means lesson planning, and grading, and countless other computer related tasks must be put on hold for who knows how long. (I'm working on all of this, by the way, and we have made significant progress this year on getting our school on backup power). At home, a power cut in the evening means no internet, no TV, little light, and no ability to unwind from a long day the way we would otherwise have planned. A power cut at night means a less comfortable night's sleep and a harder day tomorrow. All of these problems are tolerable in and of themselves, but when they are only here for a season, you can tell yourself, "just a few more weeks of this and then it will be better", and it gives you hope. When you have NO idea when the next cut will be nor for how long it will last, there's an anxiety that sets in and the next time the power DOES cut, hopelessness and helplessness pervade.

I don't mean to complain. We knew when we came here that there would be sacrifices. But I'm the kind of person who likes to try to solve problems... make progress... improve life. And as it starts looking more and more like our "short term" trip to Senegal is heading more towards an indefinite stay, I would like to see about solving this problem, which is actually not that hard to do.

There is a way to hook up a piece of equipment into our electrical system as well as a couple of 12 Volt batteries which will allow for our entire apartment to continue functioning virtually normally when power cuts. For you technical people, I'm talking about a pure sine inverter. Whenever the power cuts, the inverter switches power over to the batteries and everything continues functioning as normal.

The reason I'm writing you about this is that the equipment we would need is a bit out of our financial reach at the moment, yet we have an opportunity to get such an item (which weighs about 60 pounds) loaded onto a container in the US and shipped out to us THIS MONTH. If we don't do this now, we won't have another opportunity to do it again for at least another year.

The cost is going to be about $2000 for the inverter. The nice thing about inverters is that, unlike generators, there is no additional cost to running it (like buying fuel). So this should pretty much be a one time expense.

I asked my dad for advice about this purchase -- if he thought it would be good stewardship of the money you send to us, and if he thought we should share this desire/need with you. He said this: "It's simple: if you can't sleep at night you can't work during the day." He helped confirm with me that this item will help us in our ministry and that it would be a wise purchase. He also seemed confident that the finances would be available for the purchase and told me to go ahead and get it while the opportunity is there.

If you would like to help with this specific project, a contribution to UEFC designated to "Evans-Maxson Emergency Power Supply" would do the trick. I don't know if all that will fit on the memo line of a check, so maybe you could add a post-it or something. :-)

We won't be seeing most of you this summer and we're sad about that, but we continue to thank God for you and your support for us and our ministry. Please keep us in your thoughts and prayers. We continue to feel that God is doing amazing things here in Dakar, and that "greater things have yet to come in this city."

Thank you for your partnership,

Mike and Mindee Evans-Maxson