Photo Reel! Update Below
El Factor Compostable Latrine workshop with my carpinteros Chiche y Papolo.
Base of Compostable Latrine. Volunteer Mark and his mason will hopefully make it up to my site to host another workshop.
Dra. Alfa helping teach Hygiene and water seminar to El Firme
Filter Maintenance course
Reading club going at the cancha's unruly grass. Project still in progress...
Before and after photo of fallen my fallen greenhouse... And there wasn't even a hurricane! The power of termites. Good news is that this is where we'll have the Compostable latrine workshop to teach surrounding communities how to build them because the termites also have really gotten my latrine and the family that lives there after me will be able to use the compostable one.
AND I got my landlord to build me the Enramada pictured above. I built the little benches to the right which we are now using for reading club. It's a better option to have it outside now with unfortunate theft problems and the blazing summer heat. I love it.
My new little cacao sack hamaca :)
Made with 2 Cacao sacks, rice sacks stuffed inside for extra cushion and butt mosquito protection, two bien fuerte sticks with holes manually drilled (it was hard), lasso string, and a rick sack stuffed with other rice sacks for a little pillow. Milagro helped me sew it because I've somewhat forgotten how to gracefully use the sewing machine I used to make the volleyball net.
And here is a picture of my friend Carlos excited for his birthday cake.
OKaaay! Hiya.
Sorry for the really long delay between updates. Thanks again for reading :)
Ok so lets start with the bad:
16 houses in my community, including mine, lost electricity in May due to a reportedly blown up transformer. To put it lightly, once accustomed to having electricity, well yes it bummed me out. I had to walk to the nearest Colmado to charge my phone and computer and most importantly my fridge is out of commision. I really like cooking so that is actually the hardest part, not being able to store food. We since have hooked up a wire to the next nearest transformer and I am getting Luz Flojo (sort of like brown out electricity)....meaning that only certain things at my house can get charged. The Luz flojo burned out my camera charger and one of my lightbulbs but luckily it seems to charge my phone and my computer. I have a surge protector on my computer and it appears to be fine. My fridge still doesn't work. Good news is that without being able to easily cook for myself I'm going to Rosa's house and talking with her a lot everyday and feeling better and better about my spanish and also the fact that I get a lot of community gossip from her. I like that she trusts me.
My backyard greenhouse fell over. One night around 3 am, Bija and I awoke to the sound of tearing sheet metal. I thought, hmm....that's a new sound - god this country is noisy, and then fell back asleep. The next morning I find the above picture. I stood at my back door laughing. The power of termites is intense. My landlord knew about it and did nothing and then once the greenhouse was on the ground they left it there for about 3 weeks. I didn't want any visitors during that time because my house looked like it was hit by a hurricane in the back but then amazingly one day Clide came by and helped clean it all up. Then even more amazingly was how I told my landlord I'd like an enramada so I can teach my reading club outside and then within the week it was up. All of my plants inside the greenhouse survived and I got an even sweeter hang out spot....I'm glad the greenhouse fell now. We are going to use the space to put in a compostable latrine since my latrine is now deemed dangerous to use. I'm also going to take advantage and use this as a Latrine Workshop for all interested masons in surrounding areas to learn a new design. In the meantime I'm visiting Rosa's house and my little bedpan. Don't knock it til you've tried it.
Good News:
Filters - Although a little frustrating, finally they are here and I'm installing them little by little. The transportation was an issue because the filters way 250 lbs each and I think in total we had over 7500 lbs trying to climb the hills to reach my community....not possible in the smallish truck we had. We took half, the driver left me stuck with the other half in another community and then it took 2 weeks to convince the drivers in my community to help me transport the other half to individual's houses. I also am having issues now with 10 families coming to claim their filter (10 are located in a colmado that I used to store them). I have gotten to the point of being rather short with the laziness. Other Donas are mad at me for not gifting them a filter. Other community members are proclaiming that I'm selling the filters....Ay dios. On the other hand, it's been wonderful going to the different houses and installing them because I really like hands on projects. I get the whole family together after I've installed the filter to review with them how to use the filter and then I check back to tell them the filter is ok to use and see if they appear to be taking care of it. All in all - it's looking like the project is going to be successful but I highly doubt I will do another cement filter project. I wouldn't mind bringing in plastic ones though. I also would like to note that the only person who really helped me with any transport issues was Clide...who at the time had serious kidney stones and was helping to lift the filters into the bed of his truck. We need more Clides in the world.
Latrines -
I took Chiche and Papolo down to El Factor to learn the first steps and design of the compostable latrine with fellow PCV Mark who is in the middle of his latrine project right now. They learned a little but I'm thinking it'd be a great idea to pay for Mark and his mason to come up and host a workshop at my house. I'm also thinking of inviting several other interested volunteers and surrounding communities to have a big latrine party :)
I just submitted my grant that will allow me to receive money for the project. My church back home raised $1881 for the project with a pancake breakfast and individual donations and this is AMAZING. Thank you so much for those that helped and I'll be posting more soon regarding this once the website it up. The grant coordinator isn't known for his efficiency so it may take a while.
Cancha-
Stillllll working on resurfacing. It's really hard to motivate the kids to help me clean the grass and break up the ground. I did have a friend, Manolo, help me one entire afternoon doing this and we covered 1/4 of the court with a new level of cement.
Eva and her girl group came up yesterday and at church I had invited all the kids in my community to come play volleyball and although the net isn't quite what it used to be...we managed to have a mini volleyball game between the two communities after I tried teaching everyone the basics again. I always lose my voice whenever we do a cancha activity and therefore I am trying to solicit an adult in my community to help me do activities like this with the kids especially now that summer has started.
Otherwise I am doing really good! I am feeling and all realms of my life seem to be back in order. I am really excited for this weekend also because Jean and her friend Sarah are coming to visit today at my site and then we are going hiking to El Limon's waterfall, Playa Fronton, and then doing the volunteer thing again in Las Galleras for 4th of July. I'm a'bringin my guitar and a'sing'n my heart out.
Also am planning on taking the Reef Check instructor course so I can help teach the class to the new volunteers. I'll post ph
otos from my last dive in Catalina...Mark has some. Here is a picture of where we were in Catalina.
Thanks so much for the continued correspondence - especially the lovely long letters. The packages have been really slow but I'll email you when I get them.
Hope all is well!
Pronto,
Sarah
