Relief Work

Due to not having internet access for the past few days, all our devoted fans (our parents) will receive two blog posts in one day. If you have a passion for watching international weather news, you may know that the quantity of rain Honduras has received in the past week has caused massive flooding in many parts of the country. Fortunately for us, Siguatepeque has not been subject to this flooding. However, since we work for Aldea Global, we have been able to help in some of the relief work to communities that are suffering from flooding.

Yesterday, when we got to work, we attended a planning meeting right away because Aldea Global had received a request for help. As we made a list of all the things we could provide this community, Dan (with his background in Natural Hazard Mitigation) suggested that water would be of the utmost importance for this community. We next started brainstorming about where we could get filtered water for free. We remembered that CEASO, an integrated farm we visited during training, has a large tank of filtered water (runoff from their roof that passes through a carbon filter into a 2,800 gallon tank) that we would be welcome to use. So, Aldea Global rounded up every empty receptacle that could be used to carry water and off we went to CEASO. Because the truck was needed for something else, Dan and I got dropped off with all the empty bottles (each ranging from 2.5-5 gallon capacity). As it started raining again, we came up with a system to fill and transport the bottles to where they could be loaded back into a truck. When it was all said and done, we contributed over 100 gallons of water through collaboration with this other organization.

While we were filling up water bottles, other members of the Aldea Global team were buying more water, gathering up medical supplies, and generally getting everything organized for us to head out. We then traveled to a large warehouse where blankets, canned turkey, anti-bacterial soap, and all sorts of other emergency supplies are housed. Everyone formed a human chain as we passed boxes into a large truck for delivery. Once we were all completely drenched with sweat, and the truck was full, we headed to the small aldea (village) that had requested our help. At first when we got there, the situation did not appear as bad as we had expected, but once the trucks were all parked, we got out and walked around the corner. Fortunately, we were wearing our rubber boots, because we were soon standing in over a foot of water and by the water-marks on the houses, we could see that the water had been waist-high.

We handed out water to the families in this small community while other members of Aldea Global unloaded other supplies from the large truck. When the day was over, our arms and backs were a bit tired from our day of carrying water jugs, boxes, and bags filled with blankets. However, we were glad to contribute in our small way to those affected by the storm.