Storm that make the roots grow deeper: Taking stock

With the trip, and the main phase of construction at the end, it seems like a good time to take stock - statistics and lessons learnt. After all, those who do not learn from history's mistakes are bound to repeat them (George Santayana).

The house construction in statistics

82. The number of days I have spent in Kenya. I think 81 of these were spent working some way or another!

883. The man days of work required to get the house to this state, excluding my input and that of supervisors. That's the equivalent to one man working all day every day without holiday for two and a half years! These days were spread across 11 contractors. If you're curious how this breaks down areas, well: Structural repairs, exterior and interior finishing 446 days

Plumbing 89 days
Electrics and lights 65 days
Windows, doors and gates 152 days
Kitchen and bathroom cabinets, wardrobes and other wood fixtures 111 days
Guttering 20 days

108. The number of receipts I have for building materials. That means 108 individual trips to buy items, and given that shopping around was required first it probably means 300+ visits to hardware stores and shops. As receipts often contain tens of items, the number of items purchased is likely well into the thousands.

638. The estimated litres of petrol used while driving around, mainly for construction purposes. I've now taken myself of both Greenpeace and friends of the earth's Christmas card lists! Given the car's poor fuel consumption rate of about 8 km per litre, that translates to about 5,100km travelled.

1.85. The length in kilometres of the pipes, gutters and conduits used during this adventure. And there is still a bit more to add in the new year! I can't even begin to calculate the length of wiring going through the electrical conduit....

Lessons

1. Hire good people and treat them with respect. This isn't really something I learnt, but rather something which was reinforced during my time here. As per one of my first blog posts, you'll hear plenty of stories of construction nightmares in Kenya. Some workmen are downright bad to start with. However, I get the feeling that some, while not bad, get shouted at so much they stop caring. I admit I was lucky with my contractors and I have my cousin to thank for hooking me up with them. But once here I treated them with respect. Even the one time had to seriously intervene and do their work myself (the parquet saga), by taking a polite attitude, one of the culpable fundis joined me and said "I want to see how you are doing this so I can learn and do it for you". I feel that as a result of hiring good people and treating them well, the quality of the workmanship has been good.

2. Count the pennies. When doing a project on this scale, every little saving quickly adds up. By choosing wisely and always pushing for a discount, you can save a fortune; I estimate that my hustling on every little item has saved at least 5,000 euros over the whole project so far; possible even more than 10,000.

To give an example, for something like tiling, the difference between the "perfect" tile which is 1500ksh per square metre and the next best thing which you can find which is 1000ksh can add up to the equivalent of 100 euros over a surface area of a normal room floor. Through pushing for a discount and getting the price down to 950, it is possible to save another 10 euros. Now imagine how the savings add up over 100 receipts containing 1000s of items. Counting the pennies is key, without cutting corners... because corner cutting is always paid for later on!

One final point about discounts... no-one's going to offer them to you - you have to ask for them! And as a friend once said, there is no danger in asking.

3. Be organised and have a plan. But remain flexible! You're probably wondering how the hell I could produce those statistics at the beginning. Well, you've probably heard that 90.19% of statistics are made up :-). The ones quoted above however, fall into the 9.81%. I have kept records of works, expenditure and materials each day. And it's a good thing I did as otherwise I'd have ended up paying people twice (or three times), getting ripped off because of not knowing how much work has actually taken place, and being unable to submit anything for tax exemption. Similarly, at the end of each day I have got into the habit of planning the next day. Doing so has limited the amount of own-tail-chasing which is done. Nonetheless, as a previous post highlighted, plans will always go wrong in Kenya, so flexibility is key. Too meticulous a plan will lead to you wanting to hang yourself from your wonkily-installed second choice dining room light fitting (which you only took because the lighting shop ran out of your first choice fitting while your car was overheating in rush hour traffic; in which you found yourself stuck only because one of your contractors messed up your day's plan by being 3 hours late for a meeting with you at the site).

4. Have a big vehicle. I have never been as upset with an inanimate object as with Katie (the car - registration number KTP 833). Some of my moments with her resembled Ralph Fiennes in In Bruges. Nonetheless, I have to admit Katie has saved me a fortune in transport (as well as costing me another one in parts and mechanics). By having a 5m long car - basically a pickup truck with a boot - I have avoided a lot, and I mean a lot, of transport costs. Katie has transported tonnes of large and/or heavy objects such as tiles, cement, paint, wood and stones. If you're heavily involved in a big construction project, I highly recommend you get a big vehicle. Though preferably one which has not been sitting unused for 13 years like Katie...

5. Keep an open mind and try to enjoy. One thing I can confirm is that construction can be very stressful. If you have never been involved in a construction project, it's easy to think that you just make a few broad design decisions, such as colour schemes, and the rest magically happens. The reality is far from that; legwork, decision making, quality control and problem solving are required on a daily basis, and they cause stress. There is no way of avoiding the stress; if you give up half way through, things will turn out looking like the witch's house after Hansel and Gretel visit. But if you stress too much you might find yourself waking up at night with wonky parquet nightmares.

I've learnt that a lot, and I mean a lot of work is required for construction projects. But by putting that extra mile and keeping an open mind, solutions to problems will appear. If you fix yourself on just one possibility, you will go insane as it simply won't work out. The final thing I've learnt though is to try to enjoy the process. It has been far from easy, but I've learnt a lot throughout, and I would hope anyone involved in such a project does as well. As you can see from the photos below, it can be rewarding!