Habitat Service Project

Three groups went on three days to work with Habitat for Humanity and its affiliate to help with houses on their site outside Accra. The work was hard, the days were hot and the satisfaction was tremendous.  Many people left with the wish that they could have come on the first day and stayed the entire time and gotten more done.
 

A number of homes on this site of 90 homes were already built and occupied.  Over the three days, we worked on two that were in progress.  This was manual labor.  On day 3, our trip divided up into 3 groups.

Two groups moved dirt from an area outside the in-progress houses to fill in the rooms of the house so that the floor could be poured.  They used picks and shovels to break the dirt, fill pans and move the dirt by hand. The new owners helped, and it seemed like all the kids in the village came to help as well.

Our group was tasked to make blocks to help finish the walls. We started with some of us physically carrying 110 lb bags of cement about 100 yards.  Some sand had already been dumped in a site, and more of the group shoveled that into an open area where it was mixed dry with the cement.

In the meantime, a group of women in our group headed for the water station to pump water into pans and carry them back about 60 yards to the mixing area. 

The local women showed how this was done, and made it look a lot easier than it turned out to be.  The pumping was a slow process because of the level of water.  Everyone seems to use this one spot for their water.

As the mix was made, it was shoveled into a form and compacted manually.
The compacted, heavy, wet, block was then removed from the form, and the process started all over again. The kids local kids really wanted to help and joined in.

We eventually ended up with about 62 blocks and a totally soaked with sweat group of people. The blocks take about a week to dry enough to use.

The groups on the previous days had spent time moving and stacking blocks and leveling areas.

Part of the joy of this project was working with the kids.  There were just enough tools and tasks that several people were standing around to interact with the kids.  They were a joy and loved the stickers that some SASers had brought.  They also loved our Cokes.

We finally had to break for lunch and were treated to a wonderful, big lunch, prepared by some of the local women.

Our new friends waved goodbye as we left from a
 too short day that we would never forget.