a little delay
Jan 15, 2009: All but two of the crew for this year have arrived including two students from the U of Illinois, who are working on small-scale irrigation, and 7 students from MIT who are working on a variety of projects. Trevor Howard, an engineer who works for Forsgren in Boise is also here, working with Susan on drilling wells. They have about finishing drilling the first well, and have made arrangements to get assistance on finishing it off. So far, the method looks good (and much cheaper than the usual approach).
The rest of us have been making loans to the villages (launching our microfinance program), building walls using the rammed earth approach, building latrines using inexpensive methods (and the local residents do all of the work except constructing the cement base), planning for the use of the tractor, and studying their school programs. We’ve had frustrating delays getting our containers cleared but we expect to receive them tomorrow after which the grand delivery of school supplies will begin. Susan has also built a library at the Catholic Mission using books that Victor Bangura helped us get. So, good progress so far; our only concern is that the time will run out too soon (I return home on Jan 28th).
Jon
I am settling back in here and beginning to visit the villages. Two days ago we went to two of them. They were excited and courteous as always. I had hoped for small groups but it was not to be. More than 100 people turned out at the first village and more than 200 at the second one, even though there was a mix up on times at the second one and people had waited up to 6 hours for us to arrive. Thank heavens we had some good news to bring them! The schools supplies, the bicycles, the block making machine and the tractor all had them cheering.
