One year already
This morning Byron told me that it is an anniversary today, one year since he started working on the project.
Here is Byron with the yellow T shirt:
The team taking advantage of the digger to carry some pipe up the hill - And NO, we did *not* hire a 32 T digger to carry pipe !!
Angel, the man with hat, has been with us for almost a year too.
Time for celebration.
Angel and the cutana
Angel is special for his ability to speak Spanish to me without me understanding a single word of what he is saying and that is after I have been here a year. He is friendly, very honest, totally reliable and dedicated toi his work. As a little extra curriculum activity we see him above demonstrating the use of the "cutana", the large flat stone that the Incas use to use to grind grains and corn. There are a few cutanas around and I guess that this is why the property is called "Uchima", in Qechua, "the place of the cutanas". This particular stone was found in the middle of a site located on our own lot near our house where signs of past living is obvious.
Servio had to leave us for another job.
The leader of the team in 2010 has been Manuel Jara, who owns the restaurant Las Truchas with his brother Roberto.
We see Manuel below on the left:
That was by the way our first attempt with the management of storm water on the road but it failed. These pipes are great (and expensive) but when they get full of dirt after a heavy rainfall, what do you do? how do you clean them? Good luck ! I now removed them all. Waste of time.
Manuel has a wealth of experience with water (he did not have his say in the decision of using pipes) an has been a great help throughout the year.
And nobody can fillet a trout with better style, in less time and with less bones left in the fillets than Manuel. Watch that knife !
And nobody can join two plastic pipes with no leak in no time at all and with no tool other than a box of matches and a bit of dry wood (just heat up one of the pipes to join and push the cold pipe into the hot pipe, no joins necessary, good for low pressures only of course):
