Feb 28, 2010

San Francisco de Asis Post-Project Details


The Americans have gone home, but followup work continues, led by Ericka Lock.  Here's an update.
Category:Peru 2009/10 
Posted by: Ann

Hi all,

It has been 16 days since the last American volunteer left and I want to give you an idea what we and the community of San Francisco de Asis have been up to.

By keeping focused on completing construction related tasks and mixing work with fun, we accomplished a lot in the past two weeks. Here is a list of the main tasks completed:

OUTSIDE THE BUILDING

  • Emptied the casitas and containers. Disassembled 4 casitas.
  • Leveled and prepared land next to the building for houses and containers.
  • Moved containers down the hill. Move tools & donations back in.
  • Poured concrete for two large slabs to be the floor of 4 casitas.
  • Re-assembled 3 casitas. We are working on the 4th one.
  • Cleaned surroundings and prepared bottom hill for more grass seeds and some flowers.

INSIDE THE BUILDING

  • Unfortunately the epoxy paint on the floor didn't dry 8-( and after working with paint company the best solution was to remove it and repaint. They were touched by the amount of effort you a all put in for this community and they donated enough paint to cover the floor with a thin layer of the epoxy paint. We armed ourselves with spatulas, gloves, masks and very old shoes and removed most of the sticky epoxy paint. Almost in parallel we removed paint (5 days) and painted floor (3 days).
  • Installed sideboards in main room, bathroom, kitchen, etc.
  • Installed door frames.
  • Kitchen sinks ready, refrigerator and stove cleaned, tables in place.
  • Completed paint job (sideboards, doors, hallway, bathroom, shower, etc).
  • Working on outside lighting

Phew!

Monday, the building and 4 casitas will be ready to be use and I will transfer the building, casitas and inventory to the local NGO, the administrator and the community committee.

As a token of appreciation we took 19 volunteers on Friday to the Castle of Chancay, a place 40 KM north of SFA where there are pools. They had a blast! (3 hours in the water splashing and having fun!)

In terms of center management and infrastructure here is a brief status - to keep this email short. The local NGO, Organizacion Interamericana de Desarrollo (OIDDH), which is responsible for the care, use and maintenance of the building has done the following:

  • Created a community committee (5 members) and hired an administrator (experience managing community centers) who will be responsible for running the center with the support of OIDDH.
  • New local security guard started two weeks ago.
  • Daycare services are being defined and registration will start next week.
  • Several mothers started a week ago to receive training to be child care takers so they can help out at the daycare.
  • Kitchen schedule and services are being arranged (food for daycare and lunch for community).
  • Maintenance and care of the building organized
  • Working on the productive programs. Carpentry shop will be setup this week.

I will continue to work closely with the community and the local NGO and during my stay here until April I will continue to go and help out setup the carpentry shop and other productive and general educational programs. I will also keep you updated of the progress!

When we drove north on the highway to go to the Castle of Chancay on Friday, we could see the yellow building shinning up on the hill and the volunteers in my car said: "Look there is our community center!", "we built it"... silence..." It's beautiful".

I'm enclosing some pictures of the volunteers and the beautiful building you have built. We are still amazed that the community center is now a reality. On behalf of the community, my family and I: THANK YOU, and thank you LUCOF, donors, African and Peruvian volunteers!

Have fun today! We will be there in spirit and you all are in our hearts!

hugs,
Ericka