December Recon: Construction Opportunities

After leaving the bonded labor factory, we moved on to visit a couple of houses that would be typical of those that our December Construction Team will be renovating. In most of these instances, the houses are in desperate need of “permanent” roofs. You see, here’s how a roof works in India. In most instances, the roof is just made of a lattice-work of thatched palm leaves. The life span of such a roof is only about 18 – 24 months before it has to be replaced, or “patched” with whatever else is available (see hodge-podge coverings augmenting the thatch roofs in the pictures here). I made the “mistake” one time of asking why the roofs have to be replaced so often, and an Indian family told me, “well, it’s not just that the thatch gets dry and brittle and lets in the rain (as if that were not enough in and of itself), but rather that the bugs get into the thatch the drier it gets. But the bugs aren’t really the problem either. It’s the rats that go up into the thatch to get the bugs. But the rats aren’t really the problem either. The REAL problem is that the cobras go up into the thatch to get the rats… and sometimes the cobras are too heavy (a 5 foot cobra can weigh 30 lbs or more) for the thatch when it is old and they fall into the house with the family.” Oooooooookay… yup…. Cobras… got it. Now THAT’S a problem. So then, our teams will be going in and seeking to provide more permanent roofs (clay tile, cement board, etc) to homes that are currently having to regularly replace their roofs with thatch. In the end, the team will hopefully also be able to train church members how to replace the roofs on their own.