Our first morning of real work

Our van stopped near one particular wooden shack in Tibang (land plot #184). The local owner of this humble abode had graciously allowed us to unload our equipment and bags onto the floor of his home, and welcomed us to rest under its shade. From there, Thay and Aan introduced us to some of the other Habitat staff with whom Team Pembantuan would be frequently interacting over the next few days. We met Garin, the construction supervisor, as well as Joyo, the construction manager.

It wasn't long before Team Pembantuan was assigned its first task, jokingly called a "warm-up" to precede the actual building work. We had to relocate bricks from the roadside to the building site (land plot #127). In order to achieve this, we formed a human chain, and passed four bricks at a time over a distance of about 10 metres. By lunchtime, we had shifted exactly 2,600 bricks!

Passing the bricks