Tuesday, September 22, 2009

San Miguel Mountain Project




September 18th

Twelve Pisco Sin Fronteras volunteers (from Australia, America, France, Denmark, the UK and Germany), with pick-axes and shovels, packed into a few tuk-tuks. Transferring into a mini-bus we headed for nearby barrio San Miguel. There we were instructed to hack into the side San Miguel Mountain, a distinctive chalky hill made of sandstone and calcium carbonate sediments. This is what a family, whose home was destroyed in the 2007 earthquake, need - our labor. It was hard work and while we did it, I wondered if this was a less desirable, but affordable piece of land. We were leveling a spot for a home – creating a terrace on the slope of San Miguel. I’m unsure about how earthquake safe this kind of building location or style will be, but terracing hills and mountains to build and farm on has been going on for centuries.

Pisco Sin Fronteras

2 comments:

  1. Looks like its hard to breathe there. What kind of sanitation do they have? What is growing in the fields beyond the "houses"?

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  2. My word that looks like truly arduous manual labor. And you're right, that is the most unearthquake-proof hill I've ever seen.

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