Happy Birthday, Jesse!

SPECIAL NOTE: Not sure which video goes with which day so here are two that are recent.  Sorry.

SPECIAL NOTE: We will hold a public presentation of some of our final videos on Tuesday, February 18th at 7pm on the Saint Mary's campus (exact room not yet confirmed). Please join us!  We would love for you to see us when we get together again and talk through our experiences and show our final projects, of which we will no doubt be very proud.  Please come if you can. Make arrangements now!

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What a day!  Jesse is having a milestone birthday today, and we are the lucky ones who get to share it with him and Gui.  We wish that Nanda (his wife) and Shelley Maeve (his daughter) were here too to share it. Our main birthday celebration with the community will actually be tomorrow on the beach in the evening, but tonight we will do our own little party just with ourselves and our main friends here.

Despite the occasion, we got right up and went to work today, this time rejoining the community crew  that is reinforcing the retaining wall at the port. The trench we dug a few days ago is the base of the new structure, which is just starting to take shape.

Those rocks we were moving early on needed to come even higher up onto the beach, so we got out the "oxcart" (remember: we are "the ox") and piled them high, then pushed, pulled, and coaxed the cart through the deep sand up the slope to unload the rocks at the top.  Different ones of us served as the ox, including Shawny (twice!).  We also had to break up some of the bigger rocks with sledgehammers, which was a blast.  All of it was hard work, but we were up to it.

We also shuttled buckets and buckets of river water up to the guys who were making concrete and filling sacks, then stacking them to make a more gradual slope rather than having the wind and rain hit a sheer wall of dirt, which, if it erodes, will threaten the Catholic church.  (And with a name like Saint Mary's College, we can't let THAT happen!)

Before we left the wall project this morning, we helped to knock down part of the existing wall, as the water and wind have compromised it so that it must be replaced.  We were shocked how hard it was for us to get the last bits of brick, concrete, and rebar to let loose, knowing that the water and wind had done that job quite easily before we came.  We rocked a few parts of it loose with our bare hands, which felt very superhuman, of course.

While all of this beach work was going on, two of us, Maya and Lauren Smith, were going door to door with Dona Odila to find plants to add to the Living Pharmacy.  They were wildly successful and they also got to see parts of the community where the rest of us have never ventured.

After lunch we headed back to the garden where all of those plants will be propagated (and protected) until the teaching area can be fully realized.  Once things get going, the plants will also be available for sale to members of Anã and other local communities.

The concrete crew got back on the coop floor, and the nail pullers kept pulling nails.  We can't believe how different this place looks than we we arrived and we are particularly happy that we are doing important maintenance on projects begun by SMC groups past.  We still have a few more big things on our bucket list over the next few days, so stay tuned as we get organized to make those things happen.  We're posting early today in honor of Jesse's party tonight, so we'll tell you more about that tomorrow.  Thanks again for following along with us on our grand adventure!

Today at the beach, we moved rocks once again. Here, we are receiving orders from Junio (the one holding the water bottle) about what to do next. 

Some of the men of Anã laying down the concrete for the new wall at the beach. 

We get pretty tired here in the hot sun. This picture shows Boo, Jaron, Katie, Max, Scott, and Megan taking a nice nap in the ôca. 

 Perhaps our favorite snack here in Anã is the “rain cakes” – deep fried, pancake-like drops of goodness. Our amazing hosts know we like them so much that they bring them to the work site for us to snack on.

Lauren Soares doing language lessons with our favorite jokester, our good friend Audair.  

 The path on the way to our worksites has been familiar and comforting throughout our time in Anã 

Walking through the rainforest will never get old!

The location of the future retaining wall being built by the DIRTies and the community members of Anã!

 The past few days the DIRTies  have been renovating these seed beds for the living pharmacy that is in the works.

The chickens waiting to break in their new concrete floor!