Gain one lose one

So we were joined by Michael today and were happy to have him back amongst the vertical people.

Unfortunately, AJ was down for the count.  None the less, the team carried on.  We are all moving slower than Monday, but each one was motivated to finish their respective "hole" or trench.  Let me tell you, it gets mighty dusty digging in a 5 foot hole.  Heather and I decided if our experience with Habitat didn't payoff, we could hit up the local bank :)

Much to my amazement, the next step after clearing all the dirt and rocks (did I mention there were rocks??) out of the hole was to put the rocks BACK in the bottom of the hole.  Of course there is more to it - must be even, compact, etc.
Today seemed even hotter than previous days.  Some even needed to nap on the Habitat version of a sleep number bed:

 

Meanwhile, Lawrence and Michael 2 were hard at it making 250 joints for the rebar.

At our normal breaks, it was important to drink water, but so hard to do so when the act of actually twisting off the cap to the water bottle was next to impossible after gripping a pick axe and shovel for 2 days!  I must say though, our lunches have been fantastic!! Of of the locals and her grandmother have brought us homemade soup, main dish and dessert each day. Sooooo good!! Here are a few other shots of the day: Thalita - aka shovel queen, Aiko and Linda proud of their rock leveled hole, and our team at the end of the day.

Well, off to rest up for tomorrow!

A little more rock and roll

Ah, day 2 of the build.  Everyone moving a little slower, but none the less, motivated to get after "the big dig" again.  (I'm thinking this crew could have finished the Boston tunnel in half the time :) ) We gained one more worker as Rachel had beaten the stomach bug that attacked her and Michael so viciously.  We were bound and determined to finish digging.  I was over joyed when the architect and mason measured the trough I worked on and pronounced it "good!"

Now, as for the other times they measured the various holes we were digging, the news was never good - or the same.  At one point, as i was digging one of the main footer holes i was told I had to dig 20 more centimeters, the next time they measured I learned I had to dig another 40 centimeters.  Apparently they don't think I could handle the news of how much more I had to go all at once.  Thankfully, all the others were experiencing the same.  At least I didn't have the same challenge as Linda and Aiko who had several colonies of red ants in their area of digging. Apparently these ants were none to pleased with their relocation so they bit the gals-a lot!
Rachel , Lawrence and Heather absolutely crushed their footer hole - over 5 feet deep - most impressive.

Meanwhile, a huge dump truck delivered several tons of huge rocks......hey, didn't we just pull their relatives out of the ground??!!!

After lunch, several of the team broke off to work on the rebar and tying it together.  Now, if you've never done this it is very meticulous work made even more challenging after you've been digging for a day and a half and have lost full use of your hands due to cramping and fatigue!

Meanwhile, we all kept on digging, and digging and digging.  More digging tomorrow! More updates to follow.  Here is the team at the end of day 2:

Dirt and rocks anyone

So today was the first day at the work site. Unfortunately, we were minus one of our fearless leaders and her husband who were down for the count with food poisoning :(. I know we missed them as much as they missed being at the site with all of us.  We're hoping it's a much better day for them tomorrow! As we started to work,  one of the things I noticed was how beautiful the scenery around us was.  We are at about 9,000 feet in elevation so the sky is a beautiful blue with the mountains in the background.  We are working on the foundation of the house so LOTS of digging for the footers!! The digging is challenging enough, but add in the occasional tree roots and a ton ( quite literally) of rocks we're pulling out of the ground and you have quite a day of manual labor.

Here's my digging partner for the day, Michael.  We traded turns with the pick axe and the shovel.

The corner footings will be over 5 feet deep and about 3 feet wide.  The trenches make up the rest of the footing are 2 feet deep and about 18 inches wide.  The couple we are building the house for worked side by side with us all day.  Pretty humbling to see Celia, the wife, swinging a pick axe and shovel right along with us.

Did I say there were rocks???

He'll hath no furry like a woman with a pick axe!

Well, that concludes today's activity.  More to follow.

First day continued learning

Well, Bogspot is not iPad friendly so have to break into smaller posts.  After our tour, we returned back to the hotel where the bartender taught us how to make a "shoofly" drink - very tasty :)

 

Jose, the bartender, told me if he taught me how to make a shoofly, I had to teach him some drinks.  Last night's lesson was a margarita on the rocks :)

The best part of the night is when the family who we are building the house for showed up.  We shared a lot about ourselves.  They told us about their background.  They are older, youngest daughter is 19, but their whole lives they couldn't afford a house because their priority was the education of their children.  Jaime, the dad, is a history teacher at school.  His wife Celia, is a pediatric nurse.  Their 19 year old daughter was with them.  She still lives with them and is studying sociology at the university.  Just though our introductions, questions and answered, tears were already being shed by all.  Celia just couldn't understand why we would fly all the way from the US to help build a house for people we'd never met.  The general response is that it's what we're supposed to do - help one another.  We are all so blessed, we should be giving back.  Here we are sharing stories. Rachel, as team leader, started off the introductions. So glad she speaks fluent Spanish :)

Here is the daughter, mom, and Kim, one of the team, talking

After talking with the family, we all went to dinner and talked more. After meeting the family, we are more excited and excited to start the build!! We learned that this will be a phenomenal week! 

That's all for now.  More later.

First full day in Bolivia and important facts learned

Well, the first day was a day of "learning" here in Bolivia.  For example, I learned that I cannot sleep (even in 1st class) on a 757 airplane where the seats barely recline. I learned La Paz is the worlds 2nd highest airport in elevation in the world at over 12,000 feet!! Now, this is an important fact to know because when you haven't slept in over 24 hours and have little oxygen to breath, one can become rather loopy! Guilty as charged!!  I also learned that if your friends go up to one of the immigration booths and one of them faints when you go up to the other booth and say "mi Amiga fall and go boom" - Rachel's head hit pretty hard :(  the guard will rush your approval through! Thanks Rach for taking one for the team!  For the record, other than a very large bump on her head, Rachel is fine.  Not gonna lie, it was kind of scary.  Here she is convincing us she's okay.

We met our local Habitat guide at the airport and loaded our bus to head to the hotel. Here's where I learned that I NEVER want to drive here myself. Holy cow, it is a free for all!!! We learned that as pedestrians, you cross the street at your own peril. We also learned that the regular bus drivers regularly drink and drive! In fact, it was getting so bad, the government passed a law that the bus drivers can't drink during working hours. Well, the bus drivers went on strike until they reversed their decision!!! Thank goodness today is some national holiday where there are NO cars allowed on the road.  I like our chances of being able to navigate the streets while walking today.
I learned that this is going to be a fabulous week.  The team bonded from the minute we all got together yesterday.
We went to visit one of the Habitat homes previously built and met with the local staff learning about the local construction etc.  we then took a field trip to visit a Habitat family that is in their house. We visited them, had empanadas (yummy!) and saw the construction type. Here the owner is explaining the layout.

Above is their kitchen

We then learned about our site. Here is where we will dig out the foundation.  From the looks of the ground, we're going to be using the pic axe A LOT!

No work site is complete without your "site sheep. "...and of course the black sheep of the family :)

Either doing his Tebow pose, or praying for soft soil.  Either way, Larry has us covered.