Being an EWB Volunteer in any country is a unique experience that cannot be mimicked with any amount of careful planning. One such experience for our team was to celebrate International Women’s Day with the Rubayan community. The community members gathered in Rubaya’s main field where the Rubayan women celebrated with traditional dance and music. The event was also attended by the mayor who delivered a speech addressing the community members and especially the women of Rubaya.
International Women’s Day Celebration in Rubaya
At the end of two weeks, Mai and Ethan took over Mira and Patrick’s role on site and started the third week of implementation. The transition has taken place smoothly and Team 2 has completed their first week successfully.
Picking up from where Team 1 left, Team 2 has completed scaffolding and second lifts for columns. They are now working on rebar for beams and formwork completion. A lot of the material was procured including CMU blocks, aggregate, cement and steel. The team learned some valuable lessons through this process as they worked around a way to use CMU blocks manufactured not as per their specifications. They have decided to punch holes through the blocks manually and work with what is provided. For steel beams, the story was a little different as the beams delivered were over 200 kg each and too heavy to even lift off the delivery truck. It would have been impossible to lift them 4m high without any equipment, hence our team made an executive decision to decrease the dimensions of the beam.
Mai and Ethan are getting to solve problems on the fly, coming up with solutions having minimal resources while also experiencing the interaction between engineering and construction play out live. This is something many engineers aspire to but only a few get to. And that is just another reason why EWB experience is so unique and why EWB volunteers do what they do.
Mai & workers on site showcasing their first column
Setting up beam work
Our team has also ventured out and gotten a chance to mingle with the community kids and know the community members better. The pictures below are of Mai and Ethan enjoying their time with the kids and discovering the future engineers within them!
Team 2 – Mai & Ethan with kids of Rubaya
