Quarantine Challenges and Goals: Feedback #2 - Agriculture & Food Processing, Getting fit with Manual Plowing, Personal Development and Professional Career Advancement
On Tuesday, the Nigerian President announced the extension of the lockdown in three states with most COVID cases by 14 more days. There are indications that other states with recorded cases may have to extend the #stayhome period to evacuate the Covid pandemic. While the quarantine days last, I am happy that I began a self-improvement campaign while at home as inspired by @Anomadsoul.
Five days ago, I made a first report of my achievements while staying at home during this period. It has really been a profiting moment creating more time for personal development (reading, study), family, house chores and writing. I am hopeful that I will be able to achieve all the goals I defined in this post and even more should the lockdown period be extended in my state.
As of yesterday, Wednesday, 15th April, 2020, I recorded another round of successful self and family building activities while others are still on course. I hope you'll get inspired and motivated as you see how much I've been able to achieve during these days at home.
Food Processing
On Monday, I ustilized the lockdown period to process our cassava into garri. Cassava is a food crop consume by all parts of Nigeria and it has many end products in its processing line including Garri, foofoo, flour, candy, pudding, snack (abacha) etc. One of the most consumed cassava product is Garri and it could be used as a soup complement, as snack and as a meal.
Processing garri from cassava is a tedious work from peeling to washing, grating, pressing, sieving and frying. It requires more hands at a family level to have it done. Myself along other family members were all in to process our harvested cassava for the production of Garri on Monday this week.
It is crucial to have garri in the house as at this time when food is getting costly following lockdown. Our garri would be ready for use by tomorrow and it's cool to u=have maximized the lockdown to save money by engaging family labour for food processing.
After harvesting the cassava, we decided to dress the farm for the next planting year. All that was involved was to clear the weed and gather the sticks and leaves and compost them for manure while setting fire on the dried part of the farm waste.
Preparation for the Next Planting Season
I woke up yesterday, Wednesday energetic. I decided to push in the energy to manually plow the farm land for the next cultivation season. It's a large land of approximately 144 square metres.
We used spade for the plowing operation and it's really a body straining exercise. Much more than plowing the land, I maximized the operation as an exercise to trim my weight while staying at home. Although I couldn't complete the plowing as the sun wouldn't let me stay anymore, the work would get completed by today evening.
I am happy that the quarantine period could be maximized to this extent. Paying for that form operation would have required as much as $15 and this would get done with family labour. This is one beautiful add to my quarantine successes.
Personal Development
I won't let a day go through without my personal development through reading. Yesterday, I was able to start up my read of Stephen R. Covey's "The 7th Habit of Highly Effective People". This is adding to my current read on "The Perfect Person Perfect Work".
While still on the introductory chapters of Covey's book, my read of the first 30 pages is quite encouraging and value-filled. One of my take yesterday is that Life is built on principles that would either be kept or not. An individual may choose to break himself against the principle and face the consequences. The principles in itself cannot be broken.
Professional Development
Within the past one week, I have been utilizing this lockdown period to further my preparations for my professional Certification and License for the practice of Engineering in Nigeria. I was able to start off the registration process and hope to push further in the coming days.
My Leisure
Conclusion
I am so dedicated to bringing out the best of this quarantine period. I'm yet to begin my coding classes for the want if a platform that would be more easy for me and that would enable me to learn a coding language useable in more than one blockchain.
I have been challenged by yet another event that I should maximize this quarantine period to sharpen my engineering skills especially with seeing how to incorporate ICT solutions to my already designed systems. This would be used for my professional engineering registration towards the end of this quarter.
All the above outlined are specifically for my personal building and equipping for the days ahead. We don't know what would happen after covid has been handled. I'm certain that it will change the way people relate, as such, crucial for one to earn the necessary skills to thrive in those days.
Again, I thank @Anomadsoul for thinking this challenge which is an effective way of utilizing the quarantine days. Surely, we could still impact ourselves and others without physically meeting people.
Thanks y'all for having my time and giving my blog and engaging read.
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