A Day to Be Jealous Of

Today was probably one of my favorite days of the excursion so far. Okay, maybe just about every day is one of my "favortie" days here, but today was pretty high up there, maybe even first or second. Remember the organization Hogar de Cristo I have mentioned several times before? Well, not only do we work in the schools with them, we also help them with what their organization's name says, "Homes of Christ," in building homes for the people of Ecuador. They only work with the poorest of the poor, (like those who earn $1/day or less or something like that--I'm not really sure where I heard that number, but I have heard it from several people, so. . . why not post it on the blog?!) and they don't just give the houses to the people; the people have to provide their own land and then they set them up with micro credit loans for the cost of the house: $800. The labor for the house is free, because they get volunteers to do it, like us, and then we, the volunteers, pay the professional house-builder (why they think we need one of those is beyond me! ;) ) who comes with us $25 for his day's worth of labor. It seems like a pretty good system.

So we arrive at the Hogar de Cristo warehouse where they assemble all of the walls and everything that they drop off to the sites of the houses for us to put together into something that resembles a house. We pick up two post-hole diggers per house and two hole digger sticks/rods whatever per house. (Only half of our group came today, the other half went last Friday, so there were 12 of us split between the 2 houses.) Then, we all piled into the back of this huge truck. Yep, we rode back there.

The houses were only like a 30-minutes ride away from the warehouse, and we only had to get on two different freeways and a few dozen bumpy dirt roads to get there. No need to freak Mom!

We picked up the owner of our house along the way, and she got in the cab of the truck so we didn't get to meet her until we got to the lot she owned. The pile of materials was there waiting for us, (no, no instructions were included) and we got straight to work. The man who we were working with was not a man of many words I will just say that. He was nice and everything, but all he would ever say was "Por aca" or "Por alla" (over here, over there) and point to something or someone and you would have to guess what he was talking about and/or who he was even talking to. It was pretty funny.

The BEFORE picture

The first job, was to dig the holes for the foundation poles (okay, here is my upfront disclaimer: I had no real previous construction experience and so the terms used in this blog entry may sound quite ridiculous to you, but I'm going to do my best) to go into. The holes had to be a meter deep. That is actually quite deep for those of you who have never dug a meter-deep hole before, thank you very much. So I was glad that it was the first job when we still had lots of energy and not the last job. It was a two-step effort with the pice of rebar to dig up the bottom of the hole and the post hole maker to dig and bring the dirt/mud up out of the hole. A great muscle-building activity I can assure you.

After/while the holes were being dug we had to put extra nails into the bamboo walls to help strengthen them or something. That was a fun undertaking. I was wishing that I had taken my dad more seriously when he was teaching me how to use (or not use) a hammer years ago while building the barn. It took a while for me to learn that I needed to be brave and hold the hammer down farther towards the base (My father's words, "You don't need to choke up on it Kate!" rang through my head several times) in order to not have to hit the same stinking nail 500 times to get it to go in. But then, just when I would start to get brave, I would get a "subtle" reminder of my rookie-ness when I missed the nail and thundered down upon my own thumb. See picture below. Needless to say, it took me a few more 500-strike nails to get over that one and a few others. This is just the swing that still has me scarred, literally.

This may look like some pansy little red mark to you, but I assure you, this blood blister buddy has stuck around with me all week. (Don't worry, I popped it on my next swing and miss, but it bubbled back before the end of the night.)

Okay, moving along. Foundation poles in and level, walls fortified, time for the floor. We made an assembly line to get all of the materials up to Lazaro and the boys and somehow Lazaro made a floor out of so few boards that I thought that there was no way possible it would actually cover the whole thing. Really, I think I should call these "miracle houses."

The owner of the house had taken off about 30 minutes after we got there to go make us food. We told her that she didn't need to, but of course that was fruitless. She came back about the time we got the floor finished so we took a lunch break. The food was amazing! Probably some of the best I have had since we got here. We were all a little worried about it, just because we try to eat at "safe" places, but "safe" or "not safe," the woman can cook.

One of her daughters came back with her too and so it was fun to kind of chat with them. She told me that 6 people are going to live in the house: her, her 2 youngest daughters and then 3 of her oldest daughter's children. She told me later that her daughter was killed 2 years ago by her husband (the daughter's husband) and that he had disappeared, the police had never been able to find him or anything. I had no idea where her own husband was and didn't ask. My heart went out to her, I can't even imagine what kind of heartaches she has had in her lifetime. She was very sweet, yet a very strong woman. A perfect example of a true "steel magnolia."

After the lunch break, we got back to work hefting the walls up onto the floor base for Lazaro and the boys to nail down. If you were wondering if the girls got to do the grunt work on this part, you are wondering right. I can't really blame Lazaro though because who would you pick to help you up there? The 500-strikes/nail weenies or the boys who even though they might not have been that much better than us girls, at least LOOK like they might. So we heaved the walls up to them and they nailed them all down.

In the meantime, I found some local kids from the backyard neighboring house who were out back trying to climb a banana tree. Sounds like a movie right? So I went back there and started talking to them and playing with them. Kids here love getting their pictures taken so that is always a favorite activity as well.

I also got some of these kids to sing for me. I will attach the video of one of their songs/yells. Okay, I actually can't decide between two, so you can choose or just enjoy them both if you wish.

Videos coming soon. . . I will let you know when I figure out how to post them. I'm sorry that you have to deal with my IT disabilities.

After the walls were secured, we lifted up the wood and the tin for the roof (I know this would have been your favorite part Dad. I know how you feel about those tin roofs.) They nailed all that down while a few of us played with the kids for a while. More kids showed up and then the truck showed up and they all climbed into the back of it. It's amazing how kids all over the world love a big truck. I asked them if they wanted to go home with us and they said, "Yeah!" And then one little 8 year-old girl asked, "Where is your home?" I told her that we were from the States and a little boy asked, "Is that very far from here? Did you come in car or plane?" "Plane," I said. "Oh! It must be REALLY far then!" "Yeah, I guess so," I said.

By this time, Lazaro and the boys had pretty much finished up nailing everything down and so we all got together picked up a few things, took some final pictures, and got ready to go. It was an incredible feeling to see the faces of the woman and her daughter as they looked excitedly at their new house and made plans for a fence and their future.

Before we took off, we had to pull the kids out of the truck. Just as we were about to leave, the girl that asked me where I was from, asked, "When are you coming back?" What do you say to that?! My heart broke. I wanted to tell her that I would come back the very next day, but I knew that was impossible. A lump formed in my throat and I said, "We won't be back. We came to help them build their house, and now it's time for us to go." "But aren't you going to ever come back and visit them? Can I see you then?" Tears came to my eyes, and I had to quickly say, "I don't know if I will ever be able to come back and visit, but if I do, I promise I will look for you, okay?" and then I had to jump into the truck before the tears came down. I hate goodbyes. I feel like we have to do them all the time here. I guess I shouldn't be too suprised though, goodbyes were my least favorite thing of the mission too, so it's not really anything new to me. I cried as we drove away and waved back at them as they waved to us until we were out of sight.

During the exhilarating truck ride home, I managed to lose my pink bandana. Sad news. We got home, and luckily we actually had finished a little early so I had time to take a super-quick shower and get dressed and run downstairs within a half an hour before leaving for another stake health fair. I did blood glucose checks during this one. That was pretty fun. It's fun to mingle with the members.

After the health fair, the ward had invited us to go to the tri-stake YSA dance they were having. Not all of the students went. We were able to talk some into coming though that weren't planning on coming before and therefore hadn't brought clothes to change into and so most of us ended up striking a deal with them that we too would just stay in our navy scrub bottoms and our white BYU College of Nursing polos. We made quite an entrance to the dance with 10 of us all dressed the same, not to mention the gringa vibes that I am sure were radiating from every fiber of our beings. We didn't really fit in at first. First of all, people here dance in lines and not in circle groups like we do in the States, so we were kind of off there. Secondly, and even worse, was the fact that compared to their beautiful, fluid-like dancing, we all looked like we were having seizures out on the dance floor. We didn't stay that long, but in the little time that we were there, we were able to make a few friends, who took pity on us and attempted to teach us a few moves so that we wouldn't embarrass ourselves any further. We didn't get good enough that I feel the need to attach any pictures of this part of the day though. :)

And that was my crazy beautiful day. Thanks for reading if you've made it this far!