Our House, en el media de la calle

       So inorder to understand our home I need to explain in more detail the general layout of village.
       Our village is separated into three different sections. Section one is a series of about twenty houses that run parallel to our airstrip, plus a dozen or so houses that are scattered between the airstrip and the river and creek about a quarter of a mile away. All of section one is located on a small mountain that is surrounded by much larger mountains. So we are on a mountain in a valley.
       All of our shops are in this section, along with anyone who has some sort of money, which is to say they make at least $200 US a month or more. We are a mere three hour walk from Brazil which means that other than physically being on the Guyanese side of the border, we are basically in Brazil. Everyone, for the most part, speaks Portuguesa and over half the people in section one are Brazilians who came to Guyana in search of diamonds and gold.
       Section two is on the opposite side of the airstrip and on the other side of another creek (which is home to a beautiful waterfall) and then on top of a plateau. Section two spans from the airstrip and then at least as far as your feet could carry you in two hours time.
       Section three is on the North End of the East end of our airstrip and spans out at least 4 hours walking. Section three is obviously by far the most remote section and is home to most of the extreme poverty in our village. We are talking not enough money for shoes ($6 US) let alone a pencil ($.10 US). 
       Anyways back to our home. We live in section one at the top of the airstrip. So we basically live in the most central location of our village on top of the hill.
       Our house is a traditional Amerindian home in our village made with thick sticks cut from the local bush, or jungle, which are used almost like we use rebar back home. The sticks are then stuffed with mud. For the roof a type of palm leaves called eebies are cut from the forest and placed like overlapping shingles to keep the rain out. Roof leaks slightly on one side of the house but I think that is due to the wind blowing the rain in and not from an actual hole in the roof.
       The house is about thirty feet by twenty feet. Inside we have two small bed rooms and a main “living area” which is where we have our table, kitchen area, bookshelf and hammocks. It is exactly what we need and nothing extra that we don't.       
          You may be asking yourself what about a toilet or running water. Our pit latrine, a really deep hole with a roofed and covered structure around it, is located maybe fifty feet away. Twenty feet from that is our “shower” which is really just aluminum covering which we bring a bucket in to. I did attach a piece of wood that sticks into the air so I can hang our solar shower, which I’ve used twice I think. We get water from a pipe that runs from the creek up the mountain to our door step. In the dry season we may be fetching water from another pipe a ways away but for now the pressure is good. Occasionally during heavy rains something will clog the pipe and cut off our water for a day or two, but it will generally work itself out.
       And that is our first house. Enjoy the photos.

Hair!

Alyssa had been complaining for weeks of the sweat that was constantly accumulating on her neck due to the extreme humidity so one day she asked me to cut her hair. Some how, must have been with intervention from providence, I convinced her to let me cut her hair SHORT. I think it looks amazing, but maybe thats because its my own work and the ring on my finger says I have to but i'll let you be the judge. What do you think?

It is Beautiful here! (Oh my goodness, we are actually doing this)

       We finally arrived at our site (like we said before we can’t tell you where our site is but if you use some of the clues we have given you, google maps and your head im sure you can piece things together). We got off the plane and we were greeted by most of the people who live near the airstrip as well has the prominent members of the village, such as our Toushou (or elected mayor) and counsel members.
       Our things, which collectively weighed 444 Lbs, were put onto a truck and carried up hill to our very first home. The Toushou, the Medex (pretty much a lead medic) and the deputy toushou (our counterpart) all welcomed us into our new home as we began to look around and comprehend the incredible blessing of a house that the village had bestowed upon us.
       We will talk about our home in another post.
After awhile they decided to leave and allow us to settle in. We stood there looking at each other for quite sometime, finally realizing that this is where we would be living, working, sleeping, cooking, crying, etc. for the next two years of our lives. We explored some of the finer intricacies of our home, of which there are few, and then set to the large task of building house.
       After while things settled down we decided to just sit and take everything in, so we sat on our door step viewing the rain forest covered mountains merely half a mile away and breathed a sigh of awwww and the absolute majesty of our new home.

Back on the Grid (for two days)

Hello Family and Friends!
We have returned from the great beyond, sort of. After 6 weeks of no phone, internet or electricity, but only a High Frequency radio which doesn't even work well at connecting within our own region we are back online.

 Yesterday we took the grueling 12 hour and at least 16 mile trek to Paramakatoi, our largest neighboring village, to connect with some friends who live in Pk and another local village. We are also taking the time to use the only internet and consistent electricity for miles. The whole experience of reconnecting in extremely strange and foreign. Our friends are the first westerners, or foreigners, that we have seen for quite sometime and the hustle and bustle of a 2,000 person is almost too much to handle. Today we went into the village store to get food for the next few days and the fact that the store had eggs, sliced bread and chocolate threw us into culture shock.We are still living and loving the dream of building community through sustainable relationships.

 More blog posts will come tomorrow but we just wanted to update any of you out there that are just drooling  for some Paul and Alyssa information. Send us an e-mail today or tomorrow and we maybe able to respond tomorrow night.