GUEST BLOG by JLD
Day 10 (read in Big Brother’s Geordie accent). We have now been here for 10 days and so far survived dangerous driving, torrential rain and at times, seriously spicy food to nearly complete what we set out to do - build two bio-gas plants in the beautiful village of Vellery.
We set up camp in the front garden of a local family. This involved setting up seven tents, digging a long-drop and creating our “luxurious” showering area in their garden. Our home is a convenient two minute walk to our work sites. The family have been incredibly warm and welcoming and are enjoying having their home practically taken over by 12 Raleigh volunteers!
Every morning at 8am after fuelling ourselves with porridge made by whoever was unlucky enough to be on rota for that day, we split into two groups of six people and walk to our respective work sites. At the work sites, we work for a good nine hours (interjected by numerous tea breaks and a well deserved lunch). At first, our tasks seemed never ending. We had to constantly dig the ground and clear water created by the torrential rain. But after a few days, the weather changed in our favour and we were able to see some real progress made on both sites.
Our tasks involved digging the ground to lay foundation for the cow shed, digging the ground to place the digester and the overflow. We also laid breeze blocks for the cow shed which involved copious amounts of cement and concrete mixing. But it hasn’t been all hard work, we have attracted some attention from the locals and have been touring neighboring houses almost every evening for tea and handmade sweets before dinner. We are contemplating getting a secretary to manage all our invites!! On a more serious note, this has helped us understand the culture, lifestyle and the challenges the villagers face (and watch football matches on their televisions!). We have got on so well with the villagers that on day 9 we played cricket with them and they seemed genuinely amused by our lack of cricket skills/ rule awareness!
Anyway, on that note we better hit the work bench! See you soon!
