Clean water and a chance to read are on their way!

This past week saw some progress with both the water project and the library project for our school. Both of these projects have been in the pipe-line for some time, but have faced delays for many reasons. Now that the main rainy season has passed, a window of opportunity has opened again to get on with building which has enabled us to get going.

Back fill in place and soil compaction underway.

The library project, although not completely funded, now has the foundation and foundation walls built and this past week we have started to compact the soil to enable the floor to be poured. Since we have been given independent school status by government, it looks like we will have the chance to keep our children at our school for up to grade 7 before they have to be shipped off to more distant locations. We are confident this will enable higher chances of success and certainly be better for everyone involved and having a library to give the children simple books to read in their own language will help the transition of education from their local dialect to Portuguese (the countries trade language).

Thomas and I going over the work plan!

The water project consists of installing a solar water pump into our school’s borehole. A water tower will be constructed which will enable a tank to be mounted to hold the water which will then be gravity fed down to the clinic and the school kitchen.

Trench dug for water line from water tower to clinic

Over the years water has had to be carried by hand from our pump or pushed in a wheel barrow. Needless to say it has been a challenge. The intention is also to construct a hand-washing station that will enable the children to wash their hands more easily prior to lunch and prior to going into the library. Grubby little hands are common all over the world and even more so in this context, so this should help improve both the hygiene of our feeding program and extend the life of the library books.

Tome our back hoe driver proudly showing his fine work! This is the trench from the clinic to the school kitchen.

Thanks for your interest and feel welcome to come and help on any of the myriad of projects going out here. If you have a skill, we can likely use it!

Here is a new possible bridge site. It looks very good so we have a few options now in place.