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katherine's community challenge |
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The build |
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Thursday 6 April Some of the group visited a village called Mahamodre this morning to see some houses completed by Habitat for Humanity last year. It was a large village and the HFH houses were dotted around. When HFH arrived in the village, their presence galvanised the villagers to start cleaning up after the tsunami and doing repairs - the effects of volunteers extend beyond the houses they actually build. We met a woman who had lost her job and her daughter just before the tsunami and then lost her home - amazingly she was smiling and gave us the first crop of coconuts from the tree in her garden of her new house. We saw a man carving elephants - he and his family had also had a house built for them by HFH volunteers. |
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 A house completed by Habitat for Humanity last year |  One of the village chidren |  Carving elephants |  Tent living is still in evidence | 
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After the visit we went back to the site - the floors of our house had been flattened and the 'whacker' had arrived. Andrew was the only one brave (or foolish) enough to give it a try - it behaved like a mad thing, skittering off after it was switched off as it slowed down! We spent the day mixing concrete for the floors and started the first course of blocks just before we left for the day. While we were working, our friend the lizard climbed out onto a log, displaying to a timid (and not very impressed) female. The women from the house next door were spinning coir, many of the village women are involved in this industry. The two little girls were out playing and helping with the coir spinning. |
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 Somasiri, Kirthi and Mohammed |  Mixing concrete for the floors |  Mixing concrete |  The walls start to go up! |
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 Spinning coir |  Our lizard (green garden lizard) |  Two of the neighbours |  The convoy of tuk tuks awaits |  One of the catamarans |
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In the evening, Dave had organised a trip to a lagoon - we drove there in a convoy of 9 tuk tuks and then boarded 3 catamarans to be rowed across the lagoon - first to a 250 year old Buddhist temple where we were given some fascinating stories by a monk about the tableaux inside the temple, afterwards, we rowed round an island in the lagoon as darkness fell - bats of different sizes swooped overhead and the men rowing navigated back to the 'harbour' by moonlight - even though it was only a half moon, it was surprisingly bright. |
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 Inside the temple |  One of the temple tableaux and our monk guide |  One of the temple wall paintings |  Another scene complete with blue devil |  Our valiant oarsman |
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Project Visit ::: Travels Around Sri Lanka ::: More info ::: Links ::: |
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