kolmapäev, oktoober 05, 2005
First Fire
It's getting clear that winter is just around the corner: Today we had the first fire in our wood furnace.
For those of you who weren't reading our blog last year, I'll tell you about it. In many Estonian homes, like ours, you heat with wood using an ahi (pronounced like aa-he). It is a kind of fireplace that is surrounded by ceramic tile around 8 feet high and 3 feet wide. What we do is build up a big wood fire in the ahi and let it burn for around two hours until there is nothing but glowing coals. Then you close the front door and the flue, which traps the heat. The warmth is absorbed by the tiles and will radiate heat for the next 24 hours or more. It is a really innovative way to heat, and is far cheaper than other forms of heat, like electric or gas. We bought our wood for this year (some really good birch, which burns really easily) at the end of spring when the prices are cheaper and stacked it in our woodshed in preparation for this winter. When the winter is coldest, we do have to supplement with electric heaters in the furthest rooms, but overall our wood furnace keeps us nice and toasty through the season.
Please keep Evelyn and me in prayer tomorrow. We have our first big test in our Estonian language class. A lot of it is based on having the basic grammar of Estonian memorized (really the best way to learn it), and this is Evelyn's strength but my weakness. Please just pray that we will do our best, and far more important than tests, please pray that we will continue to internalize the language so that we can communicate in the way that we know will enrich our work here.
--Tim
For those of you who weren't reading our blog last year, I'll tell you about it. In many Estonian homes, like ours, you heat with wood using an ahi (pronounced like aa-he). It is a kind of fireplace that is surrounded by ceramic tile around 8 feet high and 3 feet wide. What we do is build up a big wood fire in the ahi and let it burn for around two hours until there is nothing but glowing coals. Then you close the front door and the flue, which traps the heat. The warmth is absorbed by the tiles and will radiate heat for the next 24 hours or more. It is a really innovative way to heat, and is far cheaper than other forms of heat, like electric or gas. We bought our wood for this year (some really good birch, which burns really easily) at the end of spring when the prices are cheaper and stacked it in our woodshed in preparation for this winter. When the winter is coldest, we do have to supplement with electric heaters in the furthest rooms, but overall our wood furnace keeps us nice and toasty through the season.
Please keep Evelyn and me in prayer tomorrow. We have our first big test in our Estonian language class. A lot of it is based on having the basic grammar of Estonian memorized (really the best way to learn it), and this is Evelyn's strength but my weakness. Please just pray that we will do our best, and far more important than tests, please pray that we will continue to internalize the language so that we can communicate in the way that we know will enrich our work here.
--Tim
