Chicken Coop Construction: Day Three

As work began, I found myself pumping 200L of water with two of the women in MCCC. Yesterday, the youth club pumped and carried 250L to the building site before they begged off to finish practicing for their upcoming dance performance.

When we finish, I help unload bricks from the wheelbarrows. Each brick being used is being loaded in front of the community building and pushed uphill to the future chicken house. I am not sure why the bricks were delivered at the community building, instead of the construction site, but it has not been that awful to move them five or six at a time. Then again, I am not pushing the wheelbarrows…

A highlight of the morning was seeing the door put into place. The height of the door provides a great sense of perspective that the walls alone did not.

The door is in place and propped up with trees until
it becomes cemented in place.

Work proceeds at an even pace. The only interruptions come when various villagers approach. One man pesters me for a job. I try to explain that we do not have any money, which he refutes with the physical evidence of our building supplies. We are halfway through construction, the team does not seem to want more help, and in all honesty, we do not have any extra money. Although he has a beer belly, I still feel a mixture of guilt and annoyance repeatedly refusing while remembering ‘M’e ‘Majustice’s comment about the hungry man the day we bought our building supplies. After over an hour, he leaves with a smile and I feel less awkward.

The women carrying 20L of water each from the water pump
marked by the big square tower in the down the hill.

My “soft hands” are less of a hindrance today, most likely due to the guys getting tired of moving the bricks. They still comment on and marvel at them, but they allow me to help significantly more.

MCCC’s Egg Laying Chicken Project has been in development since March 2015. After many delays, MCCC and I were able to write a successful grant proposal for a VAST grant through Peace Corps. VAST grants are funded by PEPFAR to help with HIV-related work and OVC (Orphan and Vulnerable Children) care. It is due to MCCC’s work with OCVs that qualified us for the VAST grant. Otherwise, we would have applied for a PCPP [Peace Corps Partnership Program] grant and would have been asking for assistance in funding this grant proposal. I encourage you to consider supporting other PCPP projects.

Posts about this project include:

 Workshop Woe, Busiest of Birthdays, Checking Out Chickens, A Day with Bo-’M’e, Chicken Coop Construction Day One, Day Two, Day, Three, Day Four, Day Five