Site tour, Hauling tools, Getting started

Sept 16 (Sun)

Today was the first day up at the home sites in Gerkhutar. We had breakfast, not too early, and headed up to the sites. We met the pastor at his church for a short time, and he told us a little about what he has been doing, and about the people for whom we are building these houses. We then walked up the hill and took a small tour of the build sites, as well as the pastor’s house (and some other homes that Journey church has sponsored). At this point it was nearly 11 and the pastor informed us that he had a service to give for one of their members who had just committed suicide, apparently a Romeo & Juliet situation where her parents wouldn’t let them be together. We all went down and attended the service until about noon. Journey pastor Kevin volunteered to say a few words of consolation to the congregation, and after that point I and at least half our group started carrying all the tools and supplies up to the first jobsite. Some of our group stayed longer at the service, and had some of the lunch provided afterwards.

We began to prepare a bunch of the blocks needed, knocking holes in the solid bottoms to slip over the vertical rebar, cutting U-blocks to be used for support beams, etc. Sporadically other group members would head down for lunch. When I started to feel a little off (dehydrated maybe? It was about 90 degrees and we were in full sun) I went and ate the lunch - rice pudding, some potato, and some sort of spicy green vegetable mixture that I can’t remember what it was, think there was cucumber in it.

Some local girls walking to school

When I finished and went back to the site, everyone was gone! Turns out we didn’t have many of the necessary materials to begin the work, so we all started at the other site through the field and up the road. I was alone at this point but luckily I remembered how to get there. This second site was to be built with 2 rooms, for 2 children who recently lost both parents. Their uncle’s house is right next door to the new home we are building for them.

Orphan Building site. The man in maroon is a local architect

So back to square one! We prepared a bunch of the blocks, snapped chalk lines, and layed out everything so we could get a start on the actual building. Some local guys came by to help us out, whether or not they are builders or just trying to help I’m not sure. But even with everyone having their opinions and sort of head-butting with the locals (we pretty much just end up doing things how they want them done, since this is their town) we ended up getting maybe 2 courses of block done around the perimeter of the house. Not a huge start, but with all the back and forth with how things were to proceed, it’s better than nothing!

These drinks were very welcome after a HOT workday!