Keeping the Community Involved

One of our major projects currently is a large-scale water reservoir being constructed in Sancayani, Bolivia, which when complete will provide water to nearly 4,000 Bolivian farm families. These infrastructure projects are hard work; for much of the tubing and channels we have to literally cut through mountains, and often just to transport our heavy machinery onsite we have to build roads first. Each day there are around a dozen community members volunteering to help on the project, doing tasks such as clearing the road of rocks and large debris for the heavy machinery:

Community residents contributed more than 32,000 hours on our last water reservoir project

In addition to the work that goes into the project itself, at the same time Mano a Mano emphasizes keeping the community engaged and informed throughout the process. For the Sancayani water reservoir project, Mano a Mano has held more than 25 meetings in the last 2 months alone. These meetings will include community members, local authorities, community associations, and residents from neighboring communities that may be affected by the project. We ensure that everyone's roles and responsibilities are clear, talk about how the construction is progressing, and address peoples' questions and concerns. Last week we held a meeting with the new leaders that were elected 8 days earlier, with more than 300 people in attendance.

We are very committed to ensuring the success of each of our projects, which starts with our collaborative model; there is a lot more that goes into these projects than the construction.

Community Maintenance Projects

To ensure that the road and water projects that we build continue to be maintained and in good condition, Mano a Mano has implemented 'jornadas de trabajo' (work days) for everyone involved in the project - Mano a Mano, local authorities, and the community itself - to spend a day or two, 3-4 times a year, on improving or maintaining their projects. This past weekend more than 400 residents of Laguna Sulti participated in this jornada, showing up with their own tools to help get their reservoir (built with Mano a Mano) ready in preparation for the upcoming rainy season.

Mano a Mano was there to work as well, arriving with our grader and a truck to help with the heavy lifting.

These community maintenance work days are very important to ensure the long-term sustainability of our projects, and we were very pleased with the hard work and participation of everyone.

Accomplishments

As we celebrate our 17th year this weekend, we continue to be amazed at what a small group of dedicated people in the US and Bolivia can accomplish! Here are just a few of our acheivements since we started in 1994:

• 120,272 - volunteer hours in the US since 1994
• 2,180,061 - pounds of surplus medical supplies shipped to Bolivia
• $10.1 million - value of this surplus
• 123 - number of clinics built in Bolivia. 115 of these clinics are financially independent and do not rely on any funding from Mano a Mano. (All clinics receive continuing health education and medical supplies on an ongoing basis.)
• 14,065 deliveries with 0 maternal deaths and 0.5% infant mortality rate (average infant mortality rate in rural Bolivia is 8%)
• Schools, teacher housing, and community sanitation projects in 42 communities
• Built 3 large water reservoirs and 153 atajados (small water ponds)
• Constructed or improved over 1,400 kilometers of roads
• 962 emergency flights

Thanks to everyone that has been a part of Mano a Mano!

Weekend Health Clinics

As part of our integrated approach to improving health, Mano a Mano provides jornadas, or weekend health clinics, in rural areas of Bolivia that have no access to health services. Doctors, nurses, dentists, and other medical professionals from Bolivia volunteer hundreds of hours of their time with Mano a Mano Bolivia traveling on weekends to some of the most remote areas of the country to provide free basic healthcare. They also give educational workshops on treatment and prevention of prevalent diseases in the area, such as malaria, dengue fever, chagas, leishmaniasis, and tuberculosis. Mano a Mano Bolivia volunteers usually fly to the jornada sites on the Mano a Mano plane; the trip can often be 15-20 hours each way on treacherous mountain roads, whereas flying reduces travel time to an hour or two, allowing more time to be spent with patients.

Jornada volunteers

Mano a Mano volunteer Nemecio evaluating a baby

Reading and Games with Sancayani Children

Yesterday was our second Saturday of books and games with the kids of Sancayani. Along with big bags full of mandarinas, bananas and bread, we loaded a few heavy boxes full of books into the back of the car and drove up to 14,000 feet to meet them in their schoolyard. As we bumped along the road at about 10:30, we came into sight of the school and the ten or fifteen kids waiting for us leapt up and ran towards us. A few pretended to hide behind the whitewashed pillars and in the door frames in shyness, but peeked out, smiling, as we hopped out of the car. It was sunny but the wind was cold, and so strong that it kept blowing our hats off of our heads. At Blanca's (Blanca works in the Mano a Mano Internacional office in Bolivia) bidding, the kids led us behind the building to where the wind was less bitter. Perched on logs, rocks and concrete ledges, we gave the older students pencils and word-finds that Tracy (a volunteer from Europe) had put together while Blanca helped the younger kids glue together foam cutouts to make churches and bells. 

Throughout the morning kids kept trickling in, arriving by bike or walking with a little sibling strapped to their back. By noon about thirty had found us. Generally the kids were fairly quiet and reserved, though more than a few were outwardly enthusiastic: the two little boys in my group of ten huddled together and whispered quietly to each other, looking around at everyone else and only vaguely trying to complete the word-find at hand; the girl at my side tapped my shoulder and proudly announced every word she found, and raced to finish first. 


After word games and foam cutouts were mostly completed Blanca and I retrieved the books from the trunk, spread them out on a blanket, and invited the kids to each pick one to read. At first they approached the blanket shyly in twos and threes; after a few minutes nearly all of the kids ages eight and over clutched a book or were crouched over the pile, shuffling around for a suitable story to read. Rachel (a volunteer from the US), Ivo (Mano a Mano Apoyo Aereo pilot) and I sat with them, listened to them, and helped them read aloud. I read with Ronald, a 12-year-old boy wearing a red sweater and homemade slingshot slung over his shoulder. He read hesitantly, following the words with his index finger, carefully sounding out each sound and neglecting the spaces in between the words. Although I'm sure he knew most of the words he was reading, I doubt he understood them as he occupied himself with differentiating the sounds of b versus d and putting syllables together. His earnest attempts at what was obviously a difficult task were immediately interrupted if anyone, particularly a girl, looked over or walked by us: his eyes would nervously glance up at her and his voice would get suddenly soft. 

Ronald

Interview with Alberto Salazar, Sancayani Resident

Last week Mano a Mano volunteer Libby Arnosti visited Sancayani, Bolivia with local Mano Mano staff, where we are currently constructing a major water reservoir project. Libby is a 20-year-old college student from Minnesota who is spending the summer collecting stories of people touched by the work of Mano a Mano. The purpose of her project is to get to know more personally the people we work with, hear their reactions to Mano a Mano projects, listen to their thoughts and ideas about the future, and gauge the need for more community improvements. While in Sancayani, a local community leader mentioned to Libby that a resident was interested in doing an interview with her.

Alberto Salazar

Below is the transcript of the interview with Alberto from Libby:

What is it like to live here? "Life is hard. There are a lot of responsibilities, starting with getting food to survive. In agriculture, even though it's a hard job – brutal – when you grow a lot, there is that much more income. In the city you have to buy everything! Everything. Meanwhile in the campo at least you have potato, beans, wheat, oca, chuño [peeled and freeze-dried potato], something. Which you don't have to buy. So in a big way that alleviates the economic situation in the family."

Shipping 75,000 pounds of supplies to Bolivia

Over the weekend Mano a Mano volunteers helped load 2 containers with nearly 75,000 pounds of medical supplies and construction equipment. The containers will be shipped to Bolivia, where the medical supplies will be distributed to our network of 120 health clinics throughout Bolivia. We also shipped bridge-making supplies and equipment in collaboration with Bridges to Prosperity, a nonprofit whose mission is to provide isolated communities with access to essential healthcare, education, and economic opportunities by building footbridges over impossible rivers. They are opening an office in Bolivia, and we shipped a number of large spools of used wire rope that will be used in the construction of footbridges.

Loading 2 spools of wire rope

Pictures of Dedication of our 119th Clinic in Santa Rosa, Bolivia

With every clinic that Mano a Mano builds, the community always celebrates its completion with a dedication ceremony. It is a huge event, and nearly everyone attends. Local leaders and politicians make speeches giving thanks, the children perform dances and play music, and often donors who contributed to the project in the US travel to Bolivia to attend as well.

Before the dedication takes place, volunteers make the final preparations to get the clinic ready for use - cleaning floors, making beds, and moving in the furniture, supplies, and equipment needed.

More pictures of this dedication are available here.

Happy Birthday to a Very Special Volunteer!

On July 4, 2011, we celebrate Gloria MacRae's 85^th birthday. Gloria is one of Mano a Mano's most dedicated volunteers and has been with us since the beginning; she made a $25 donation to Mano a Mano during our first year in 1994 and then, she says, it took over her life. Over the years Gloria has recruited many volunteers and donors, always carries a Mano a Mano brochure in her purse, talks with everyone she knows about our work, requests donations of medical surplus, and the list goes on. 

We even have her to thank for helping get our clinic program off the ground. When we celebrated Gloria’s 70^th birthday in 1996, we kept secret that more than 100 of her friends were raising funds to build the first Mano a Mano clinic in her name, “Clinica Gloria”. Imagine her surprise when we presented the gift: enough seed funding to build two clinics, Clinica Gloria I and Clinica Gloria II. And the rest, as they say, is history. 

For her 75th birthday we had a new challenge. Northwest Airlines had donated 8,000 crystal glasses to Mano a Mano, which we planned to sell as a fundraiser. Gloria was our best salesperson; she even began carrying glasses in her purse to sell for $2 each to everyone she knew, and we raised over $16,000!

Gloria was born in Empress, Alberta, Canada on July 4, 1926. She emigrated to the U.S. to attend the University of Texas, became a medical technologist, and worked for a pharmaceutical company until age 35. Beginning to feel restless in her lab-focused job, she decided to seek another career and chose social work through the University of Minnesota’s masters program. She worked as social worker at Gillette Hospital, Ramsey County, and Anoka State Hospital until she retired. Not one to stop at that point, she went on to teach English to spouses of foreign students, became the volunteer social worker for Macalester Plymouth United Church, served on the review board for the St. Peter Security Hospital, and adopted Mano a Mano. 

For every birthday since 1996, it's become a tradition for Gloria to encourage friends to make a donation to Mano a Mano in her honor. Gloria exemplifies the spirit of our organization, and we thank her for her tremendous support; Happy 85th Birthday Gloria!