-
Brick Seva
For weeks now, we have been laying foundations and pouring the cement columns for house after house. It is critical work as the columns we build, firmly anchored and with extra reinforcement, will make an “Amma House” one of the safest in the valley. Today we started brickwork and it put everyone in a great
-
Learning and Teaching
I have tried to point out some of the positive aspects of village life here. We can learn from these people, but there is also much that we can teach. Yesterday I watch ten older ladies learning to write for the first time. Their faces were beaming with joy at the opportunity to learn something
-
The house across the river
I see this building every day. It is directly across from our place of stay. It is always busy with people working around it. This morning at dawn, I noticed the light in the lower right window and finally realized people are still living there. Last night, Umesh asked how much I paid for the
-
A simpler life
Everywhere you go, you see them. Women carrying heavy loads on their backs. Mostly it is huge bundles of grass or tree limbs for their cows, but I have also seen a full gas cylinder weighing 70 pounds in a basket. This scene is repeated around the world in most agricultural communities. The striking thing
-
Men with mules
Who do you call when 10,000 kg of cement show up at your doorstep? Men with mules of course. Today we received a full truckload (200 – 50 kg bags) of cement. This is enough to build less than three houses. It took just five hours for six mules and their five handlers/loaders to move
-
Tin Schools
Just 100 yards further down stream from the house seen in the last post, two of the three schools in Chandripuri were washed away. Both are operating again in temporary metal buildings. There is no heat anywhere here, so all buildings are cold and damp in winter. At any school, the day begins on the
-
The most beautiful home site
This is one of the most beautiful home sites I have ever seen. A perfect view of the Himalayas rising over yellow terraced fields of mustard. Sitting alone on this beautiful plot of land will be a single house, our ninth in Batwadi Sonar. It’s owners will be the Singh family, Lakhpat, his wife Manju
-
Vocational Education and Training at Uttarakhand
An important part of Amma’s rehabilitation work in Uttarakhand is the Vocational Training Program. It is off to a great start. Three centers have already been inaugurated — in Ukhimath, Gupthkashi, and Agastyamuni — and local trainers have been hired. Each center will offer economic empowerment through Computerized Vocational Education and Training programs (CVET) and
-
Building a house by hand
The terrain here makes any kind of mechanized building impossible. A cement mixer is too heavy to be carried up the mountain, even in pieces. So, we are doing everything by hand. The skeleton of our house is nine steel re-enforced cement pillars. Very heavy bundles of 24 foot steel rods are carried up
