Laying the Foundation

March 20, 2010

It was easy enough to decide where we plan to place the biogas digester, but it is a quite a different story making a solid foundation in the clay filled hill that we had selected. Brigitte and I decided to locate the biogas digester just outside the kitchen for easy access and use. The land surrounding the building slopes quickly downwards so the first order of business was to create a level and solid foundation for the 1130 gallon tank and all the degrading food that it will hold.

After debating a multitude of options for supporting the big lug, it was decided to dig a hole in the hill to level the ground, set the foundation in cement, and build a cylindrical wall to set the digester on top. Sounds basic enough, right? Well, let me tell you about the Amazonian soil: it is much less dirt and more like clay. Digging four feet into is trouble since it sticks to the shovel, so it is work to get it out of the soil and work to get it off the shovel...and don't get me started about the heat that we did all this digging in! Once that grueling work was done, we lay our sand to level the ground, drove some rebar into the ground to fortify the wall, set the first layer of bricks for the wall, and poured the cement for the floor. Foundation complete! Now let dry and onto building the wall!

Assessment of Need

While the doctors were attending to their patients, Brigitte and I worked on compiling information for a needs assessment for the area. How are these people living now? What do they eat? Where do they poo? What do they want to see change in their current lifestyle and has any outside help been beneficial to them before?

On average we visited two villages a day which is quite significant since there is sometimes a two hour ride between communities and it is seriously too hot to work in the middle of the day. We visited 14 different villages spending time learning about their daily life, agriculture, health issues, income sources, education, town layout, hierarchy, etc. We talked to many people and played with children.

Coordinates were taken at the significant landmarks of the village. Each had a very similar set up and layout with all the houses lined along the water for close water source, a school and generator house(for the larger villages) established by the Peruvian government and sometimes there was a secondary school. Many of our hand drawn maps looked very similar.

We found that some of their main crop is yuca, bananas, papaya, and sugar cane. To earn money for the family, men leave the home to work in lumber yards which is a two day boat ride away from the village. This is also frequently how disease is berought back to the villages. Women stay home to care for the children and tend of the house. All villages had a primary school but many of the small ones did not have secondary schools. As a resuly, many people do not matriculate past the 6th grade because students need to be sponsored to live in the larger villages to continue studies.

We quickly learned where their bathrooms were when one of the medics asked for el baño and a child directed him behind the school and said, "Anywhere behind there is fine." I belive the doctor held it for several hours before we got back to the boat. We were all relieved to relieve ourselves!

The aid that has been provided by their government has been limited in its utility. For example, the Peruvian government installed toilets in many of these villages and now most of them are now used as flower pots, chicken coops, or just left to decay. I asked on child what one of these 'contraptions' was and she had no idea...she just shrugged and giggled.

So now that we have a better idea of the people, communities, and lifestyles, we can focus our design so that we can get people interested!