UC Davis Blum Center for Developing Economies

Friday, September 13, 3:19 PM Maybe I should be a tab bit more serious after my last blog? The past few days have seen marked progress in our project. After our initial escapades at IMAP, we decided we should split up to get more work done in different areas. Irene, Jamel, and Eduardo stayed at IMAP to get a tour of different greywater reuse systems they have built, receive their theoretical information, constructed a practice distribution system for one of the existing banana rings, and tested our lysimeters (devices capable of extracting water from soil at various depths). Soraya, Matt, Ariel, and I left for Chocola so we could take greywater samples from the community. We planned to take the samples Wednesday morning and bring them back to the lake for testing. We took a map of the community that Semillas Para El Futuro (the NGO) had and added locations of houses and nearby rivers. My group split up and had Soraya and Matt take samples to the laboratory of Universidad Del...

Tuesday, September 10, 9:52 AM I write this from the back of a pickup truck taking us from IMAP, a permaculture center by San Lucas to Chocola, a small town where we are going to build pilot greywater reuse systems. Boy what a time we've had the past few days. The word sketchy has come to mean something akin to suspicious in urban vernacular. But I think for our team it's come to mean the adventures of this trip. Where to begin: Guatemala city is the sketchiest place I've laid eyes on. The hostel (graciously provided by University of San Carlos) was fortunate enough to be placed by 6th Avenue, one of the main streets where police actually patrolled and enforced good behavior. Unfortunately for us the closest bakery where we could could eat to avoid demolishing our immune systems with street food was on 7th Avenue. The magnitude of difference in only going one block away from the policed street was mind boggling. Lights were dimmer, men were staring at gringos like vul...

So here is where the fun starts. We arrived back in Guatemala yesterday for the start of a P3 trip (for me, this is my second trip).  We have 3 goals for this trip: 1) To become trained in IMAP's understanding of greywater reuse. 2) To characterize components of the pilot systems including the greywater, the performance, and the clogging rates, and 3) To receive an understanding of the community and its potential interaction with the system. Through Eliska Rejmonkova, professor from UC Davis and our adviser, we connected with a group of chemistry students at the University of San Carlos (USAC) in Guatemala City and they graciously picked us up from the airport and helped us in searching and collecting reagents and other materials. We slept in a hostel provided by USAC and today we are going to continue finishing up our materials shopping and then potentially head over to the Lake Atitlan. Guatemala is just as beautiful as I remember it and we haven't even been to the L...

A lot has happened since the last trip... The UC Davis Engineers Without Borders, Guatemala team (lead, Imaan Taghavi, is a 2013 Blum Center grant recipient) received a grant from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's university competative awards program called "P3", giving the team $15k to complete research on greywater reuse options for rural communities in Guatemala. We are working with an existing technology we call "Banana mulch rings" that has recently been utilized in communities around Lake Atitlan and seeking to optimize results. The term "optimization", means we are picking and choosing various components of the system we would like to make improve. To this extent, we have assigned each of our 7 team members a specialization so they can focus on one specific are for optimization. Our team: Imaan (team leader): Economics, Social Understanding, Water Quality Matt (team leader): Soil, Water Quality Eduardo: Tipping Bucket Jamel...

Even though the weeks have been full of work, we took a Friday off last week and had a goat roasting party at the office. It was a nice way to celebrate the various activities we have accomplished and spend time together outside of the office and field. I was responsible for cooking the pork and I think everyone was surprised that an American girl could actually cook over charcoal successfully. It was a night full of laughter and a really great ending to a busy week. Sutter Allen, undergraduate student, Human Development, UC Davis

Last week, we took 60 Batwa students to a boarding school for three days for a youth empowerment camp. Each day the students attended sessions on leadership, planning, resource management and income generation, health and family planning, and on the importance of education. I was responsible for teaching leadership and a part of the health lectures. Outside of lecture, I spent time with the thirty girls making friendship bracelets, singing songs, dancing, playing netball, and just simply laughing. By the time camp ended, the kids were in tears having to leave but thanked all of the BDP staff for teaching them so much about taking charge of their own lives. I think it was really successful and next time camp could even last a full week. Sutter Allen, undergraduate student, Human Development, UC Davis

The school garden at Mukongoro Primary School has been my main project while working with BDP. The Batwa students have been suffering from malnutrition and some even fail in school because of their poor health. To help solve this problem, Bryan and I have been building seedling beds and starting a school garden full of vegetables that can be used for a school lunch program. We have now finished four seedling beds, and all of the seeds have sprouted. We are spending this final week transplanting the seedlings into a larger plot of land so they have room to grow. Within a few months, the kids should be having beans, “do-do”, cabbage, tomatoes, and eggplants for lunch. After I leave, Bryan will continue to monitor the garden and the health of the Batwa students. Sutter Allen, undergraduate student, Human Development, UC Davis

The last month working for the Batwa Development Program (BDP) has been full of excitement, exhaustion, laughter, success, failure, and everything in between. We mudded a house, started a garden at a primary school, spent half a week running a camp to empower the Batwa youth, and of course had time to roast a goat and celebrate all the work we have done. My time is starting to come to an end here and it makes me sad every time I think about having to head home. On the positive side, it means I have had a wonderful summer here in Uganda and all the memories I have made will not soon be forgotten. Mudding A House in Nteko Batwa Settlement:  A group of us took a three-day backpack trip through the Bwindi Impenetrable Forest to a Batwa settlement called Nteko. “Up hill both ways” has never been truer than for this backpack trip! When we finally reached the settlement, we were exhausted but had little time to rest as the next morning we woke up early to start mudding a house for a ...

The group in front of the marketplace latrine with our educational poster Ah, the marketplace, the place that I’ve heard so much about.  The reports I had read mainly focused on the Marketplace latrine and I must say, the impression they gave was pretty accurate: big, dirty, weekly, and lots of people yelling at you to buy their stuff and then yelling at you for not buying their stuff.  Today we decided to give a presentation on best practices for using the latrine while we were there.   We brought a poster, prizes, and my ukulele; we had been told that you can get the attention of people by playing an instrument first. Thanks to George who did the translation for us; he understood fully how the marketplace latrine was supposed to work and was able to answer the many, sometimes angry, questions from the crowd.  Many people were appalled that men and women could use the same stalls even though each stall was completely private. Dagan Trnka, undergraduate...

If my trip to Ecuador has taught me one thing, it’s that “subir” (to climb) is challenging.   I learned this the hard way as I adjusted to Quito’s mountain elevation. I also learned this talking to youth that participated in a program evaluation sponsored by Freedom from Hunger .   Through improved access to financial services, young people can “subir,” rising above what is expected of them.   They are “moving up”, both personally and economically. Their dedication is inspirational. Especially because “subir” isn’t easy. But it’s definitely worth it.   Randall Cass, graduate student, International Agricultural Development with Lady Carolina Tavarez, undergraduate student, Spanish

With the whole group together, our first Sunday has come and because most people go to church on Sunday and because we don’t impose ourselves on the community (the pastor would switch from Luganda to English if he saw us in the crowd, which he would) we have decided to go walk up to the radio towers and try to see what kind of view we can get.  Unfortunately, on the way up this hill, we made the mistake of assuming that any old dirt road (all roads are dirt roads in Nkokonjeru) that headed towards the hill would get us to the top.  Needless to say we didn’t get to the top, but we did see some awesome views, but then again compared to Davis, anything with a little variation in geography and foliage constitutes as a view.  We also saw a number of small farms along the way, I have to say, agroforestry was in full swing.  I have already become accustomed to little children coming by and saying “Bye Mzungu!” but today we passed a kid who saw us and immediately ran...

Our project was made possible through Freedom from Hunger , the nonprofit that funds the youth savings programs we are studying. The organization believes that educating youth about good financial habits and encouraging them to save will help bridge the poverty gap as Ecuador’s next generation enters the workforce. Of the dozens of youth we’ve met with so far, there is one young man that particularly exemplifies a success story for the program. This young man is 19 years old. He started attending the program’s financial education talks over two years ago, and opened a savings account shortly after. We visited him at his home in a rural area in Ecuador. There, on his family’s pig farm, this young man explained to us how the savings program encouraged him to plan for the future, secure a job, and save. Through the job he currently works, he is able to put money away in his account and help support his mother, brothers and sisters on their farm. He hopes to continue working ...

I have to say I am a bit overwhelmed by all that’s around me, so many new things to take in, so many things I don’t know.  I’m grateful now that we had the first couple days of the trip planned out before we left.   The process of going to Nkokonjeru went smoothly and we were well welcomed into the guest house at the convent.  They had made signs saying things like, “You are Welcome!”, “We Love You”,  and “Feel at Home”.  And to top it off, there were western style toilets and running water (but not for drinking). Megan and I met Matt when we got in.  I have to say it is a little humorous that the first time I’m meeting Matt is half a world away despite the fact that he was an hours drive away in California.  We have been briefed on the situation going on in town.  Supposedly, it's the dry season and out of the 13 boreholes around the town, only a few are working.  This puts us in a difficult situation: we could help out with th...

Well I’m never too sure how to start something like this. What I’m referring to is this journal and packing.  Though I can’t say I’ve ever kept a journal for everyday stuff, I have kept a journal for writing down thoughts.  And as for packing, it’s surprising really, I pack for long trips all the time.  I suppose that still doesn’t take away from the fact that I’m packing for a place I’ve never seen before, a place where I don’t know people.  Regardless,  I’ve been stressing about getting stuff together, it's not a matter of what to bring, but rather what not to bring.  I can only be thankful that Jessica wanted to help and is driving me to the airport in the morning.  The whole thing still hasn't really hit me yet, I'm still just going through the motions as if it was everyday.  But when I do think about it, I am really excited: Even before High School I had always had it as one of my goals to go to Africa and do development work and even thoug...

Here in the Andes, the elevation can get to you. For me, the transition from life at sea level in Davis to the 9,000-foot high city of Quito was quite the unexpected challenge. Altitude gain can make you dizzy, even sick if you do not take precautions. For those first few days you feel a little lightheaded and out of it. Walking up a flight of stairs feels akin to finishing a half-marathon. You sleep 12 hours a night. It takes time to get used to being so high in the sky. The Spanish word for gaining elevation is “subir”. It also means rising or moving up. “Subir” isn’t easy. But it is definitely worth it. The city of Quito is literally tucked in the clouds and nestled between majestic mountains. There are endless photo opportunities. The city center is so dense with historical landmarks, unique architecture, and cultural exhibitions that it has been named a world heritage site. However, Carolina and I are not here to be tourists. We are in Ecuador to conduct better understand ...

My name is Dagan Trnka, welcome to my blog. This is an account of my trip to Uganda during the Summer of 2013.  I am on this trip to do international development work with Engineers Without Borders at UC Davis with a team of four people.  An introduction to the cast of travelers: I am the Lead of this project, Bill is the mentor, while Mirann and Megan are in charge of workshops and education.  EWB-Davis has been involved with the community of Nkokonjeru for over 6 years now.  We have implemented a number of projects whose purpose has generally served to address the issue of water quality holistically in the community of Nkokonjeru.  My purpose on this trip is to close out our involvement and ensure that the community has the tools to continue proliferating and maintaining the technologies we have implemented. Several things to note about this blog is that I am not going to be making standard blog posts, instead I will upload video blogs and take pictures ...

Well it seems that great American holiday has come and with little celebration, gone.   As a group we decided that we should try to  celebrate by getting a couple beers, but it seems that didn’t happen.  Instead,  just Megan, George, and I went out to Matthew’s Bar to get a beer and then called it a night at ten, happy independence day America, I should have found a way to get some fireworks or at least make some out of what was around.    Even Bob the Brit wished my group a happy independence day.   I’m sure in his history classes our independence as a colony was probably just one of those, “So we had a bunch of colonies, some became independent on their own, others we helped out,  a couple of them became successful, end of story.” Dagan Trnka, undergraduate, mechanical engineering, UC Davis

Friday, July 5 Imagine a world with less than half the regulations and laws of where you live, then imagine that the enforcement of the laws that are around is minimal.  What you would get is something that closely resembled the town where I stayed.  Most of the guys riding Boda Bodas around shuttling people from here to there don’t have a permit, welding is an outdoor-on-the-street activity, and the government coming in to check whether or not your restaurant is following health code? Not a chance.   It’s not just that the government is less constricting, it seems the whole culture is a lot less restricting in general: little kids walking cattle and goats to and from where they stay, three year olds wielding machetes to cut fruit, the whole thing would make a lot of Western parents cringe.   As for myself, I kind of enjoy it, I feel less constricted to do the things I want to do, but I ask myself this question: would I really want less restrictions...

Finally after two weeks of digging trenches and mapping out the new route for the distribution system, we received the materials for the pipeline. However while we had received a majority of our materials, there were some parts that didn’t come or some that were the incorrect size. While the new order was being taken care of and pieces were being returned, we started laying the first section of the pipeline. We broke down the system into four or five housing sections for engineering purposes. Luckily for us the community members were familiar with the pipe material we were using, Supertubo HDPE pipe, because they had used it for their intake pipeline, which is going to run from the source to the water tank. Their familiarity with the pipe really helped speed up the process of unrolling, laying, and applying the connecting joints of the pipe. While the familiarity made the work run smoother, there were plenty of challenges that would pop up while we were working. One of the biggest ...

I am just about halfway into my third week in this children's home and I've become to feel very familiar with the place. The physical comforts of home that are absent here were surprisingly easy to get used to. Admittedly, there isn't all that much to get used to since this part of Nepal has been very comfortably developed. This particular home has both flushing and squat toilets, a water pump outside, a water filter in the kitchen for drinking, and two showers (although most of the children just use the water pump to bathe). There is no hot water, but I don't think I would use it even if it were available since it's so hot and humid here. Electricity cuts out often, which is a problem for almost all of Nepal, but it's really not so terrible. Electricity here is used only for light, fans, and internet. We only need light in the evening when the sun goes down, fans can be easily substituted with whatever scrap of paper is lying around, and internet is hardly used...

Walking to the future garden at Mukongoro This week has been busy with starting my new projects under the Batwa Development Program. I am first working with the agricultural coordinator to develop a school lunch program at Mukongoro Primary School for Batwa students. Poor nutrition is one of the biggest problems contributing to the cycle of poverty in this village. Many Batwa suffer from poor nutrition and a school lunch program could significantly help the Batwa children by providing them with at least one full meal per day. For the school lunch program, we have realized we need to start from scratch by growing the food. We have a man (named Jumba) specifically responsible for the gardens. He is also being taught how to harvest the seeds so that he can continue the garden for years to come. The plan is to have some students from the school as his helpers so they can learn the skills and share them with their families back at home. On Tuesday, Brian and I hiked up the mountain ...

A few days ago, I accompanied the children to their school. All but two of the children here attend the same public school not very far away. I was under the impression that I was to follow them to school and teach whatever subject where teachers were lacking, so I assumed that the school was fairly small, new, or poorly developed. Instead, the school turned out to be a rather large building with a couple hundred students pouring in from nearby villages. With about two dozen classrooms and just as many teachers, I was more of a guest for the children to stare at rather than any real help. I observed the English teacher and did help teach a couple classes, but with little grasp of the students' prior knowledge and English level, I could only do so much. My greatest contribution was to make the children, who wanted to impress the sister (everyone in Nepal addresses each other as “sister” or “brother”) from America, behave well in the classroom. At one point, a Grade 1 English tea...

Goodness, it has been quite a while since I have blogged. I’m beginning to pack all of these last minute things into my schedule. On Tuesday, I ran an errand for my internship to pick up MetroCards for the clients all the way downtown on 21st and Broadway. I finally decided to try out one of those breakfast food trucks that hang out right outside of the buildings. I finally found the famous Anthora cup! Coffee was only $1, and it was delicious. That afternoon, I met up with my friend, Michelle, from my high school days to catch up and get French macarons at Lauderee with her and took a walk in Central Park. I came across the famous reservoir, and it’s HUGE. Fortunately, we managed to escape from the rain by the time we got home. Fast forwarding to Thursday, I finally had a chance to assist the economic stability workshop at STRIVE. We were helping the students in the class with how to attach resumes, search for their documents on their computer, and how to send an email to a po...

These past two days consisted of me shadowing and assisting the workshops which were mostly about maintaining a healthy relationship with one’s significant other. Yesterday, we explored the definition of conflict and how the participants can solve the conflicts that are going on in their own relationships. On a blank sheet of paper, the participants defined ‘conflict’ to be “a ‘misunderstanding" “miscommunication, “having trust issues", “being selfish" were a couple. An interesting one that was mention was “having no conflict is conflict because if nothing is being said about a problem, then there is no resolution. When examining why people get in conflict, the participants stated that there was a lack of communication, understanding, and clarity, or it could be a matter of ego, expression, and this desire to “push buttons". Using the definitions that the participants came up with, the class was supposed to pick a recent argument and explain how they felt, what mi...

Today was the first time I attended a fatherhood workshop! I was able to watch one of the coordinators host a workshop about healthy relationship building with one’s significant other. There were 4-6 other clients in the workshop. The main intention of the workshop is that it serves as a focus group in which the clients are able to speak about the issues that arise in their relationships with those around them. To start the workshop, the facilitator asked the clients to focus on the definitions of what they think a relationship is. One stated, “a relationship is bond with common ground and association that has long and trust with one another.” Another said, “how a person relates to you with a common interest and relate to one another". Some offered descriptions of what a healthy relationship entails, such as “trust and respect for one another" and “having a mutual understanding with one another is what forms a good relationship". The workshop also focused on discussi...

Two weeks ago we headed to Kampala for Barnabas’ best friend’s wedding. It was a long 12 hour, over-night bus journey to get to Kampala… especially while still struggling with malaria. There used to be a bus that left from Butogota (which is just a few kilometers from Bwindi) to Kampala, but it no longer operates so we had to travel to Kihihi (about an hour) on boda bodas to get to the bus to head to Kampala. By the time we reached Kihihi, we were so covered in dust that even our tears (from the wind blowing in our face) made mud. It made for some good laughs though. We reached Kampala at about 5:30 the next morning and went straight to Hotel Catherine to check in and head to bed. I was pretty sore from sitting in the bus for so long after getting injections in my bum and back for malaria treatment, and from having a fever, that I was ready to lay down in a bed. That afternoon, after some much needed rest, we headed into downtown Kampala for some shopping and to get some food. We wer...

Today marks the beginning of the “hot" days to come. Coming from Davis, 93 degrees does not seem bad at all, but when you add on the humidity, wow, it’s a whole another level of heat. I’m starting to get used to the weather here, but I noticed that the thickness and quality of the air are certainly affecting the health of those around me. Next door to STRIVE is a preparatory school, and right next to that is a dumpster-like area that I always pass by while walking to work. It’s definitely not an ideal place to have a dumpster, the stench is certainly unbearable. Prior to my arrival, I know that East Harlem always had a problem with air quality. As a result, there is a high asthma rate that exists in the area. A few of my co-workers had a hard time breathing and had to purchase asthma pumps to help them get through it. As for my work with STRIVE today, I actually accomplished quite a bit! I spoke to my supervisor last Friday about working more directly with the clients. She agr...

It has only been day 7 of my internship, but already I feel as though I have been fully incorporated into the organization. Yesterday, I had the chance to attend a block party in the Bronx hosted by the Bronx Defenders. Everyone in the community is invited to see what community based organizations are doing in order to serve the community and show what resources they can provide  for individuals. About 15 different CBOs came out and many of them were giving out free burgers, hot dogs, ice cream, freshly printed t-shirts. During the event I was helping to run the STRIVE booth and we were able to get several individuals to sign up to find out more information about our workshops. We will then be contacting them these next few days in order to invite them to sign up for orientation to attend these workshops we have to offer. I think one of the problems that STRIVE is hoping to address is to reach out to potential participants. However, with the help of social media and go...

I’ll start with the negative of today. My MetroCard stopped working. I guess when I was bussing back from Riverside with my co-worker yesterday, the bus that scanned my monthly unlimited card damaged the black strip on it. Now I can’t use it anywhere. The worst part of it is I paid in cash since the teller didn’t accept debit/ credit cards and IN ADDITION refused to give me a receipt. Why didn’t I go to a kiosk? Lines were ridiculously long and that day, many of the kiosks did not accept bills. My friend was once a victim of identity theft because of those kiosks so I didn’t want to take any chances that day. Apparently, MTA doesn’t offer protection for unlimited cards paid in cash… which is frustrating, but I am hoping to get a refund tomorrow through the Customer Service place in Lower Manhattan since it wasn’t my fault. In terms of the rest of my day, it was great working with other student interns that are planning the Fatherhood Image Film Festival in August! The event’s inten...

The past week has been full of memory making. I have settled into my routine and life is simple and great.  Mornings are spent preparing for the day with hot milk tea and bread while examining my bug bites from the night before. I then walk down the red dirt road to the women’s centre with all of the women and the children heading to school. I have been spending my time at the centre cleaning and taking inventory of all the supplies and products to get an idea of our input and output. After the day’s work, I head to the volleyball pitch (Mondays, Thursdays, and Saturdays) or to Bible Study or Fellowship (Tuesdays and Wednesdays) with my hospital and BDP friends from last year or I just go home to rest and read (Fridays).  After the various evening activities, Barnabas and I prepare dinner and invite over whoever is around to eat with us. Dinner has been liver, chappati, pork, matoke, posho, noodles, or rice lately. Dinner here is always late and morning always seems to come ...

The last few days we’ve been in the field visiting rural villages around Comé, in southwestern Benin, speaking with the women and youth saving groups there. We observed their meetings and had brief interviews with each community agent (who leads the group) and some of the members. The days are 70% driving around to the villages and 30% spending time with the groups, but that 30% has made the whole experience incredible.  Women's savings group meeting Each savings group is a part of Freedom from Hunger’s Savings for Change program, implemented locally by an NGO called BUPDOS. The idea behind the groups is that everyone contributes a certain amount of money each week to the group savings box. Members can then use that money to take out individual microloans with an agreed upon interest rate, typically around 10%. Loans average between $10 and $20. Everyone holds their neighbor accountable and there are fees for missing meetings or payments. Nearly all the women and childre...

I've been back from Lake Atitlan in Guatemala for a few weeks now and a lot has happened. Our proposal to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's P3 program that the Guatemala team at Engineers Without Borders-UC Davis submitted was successful in Phase I! We received a grant award that now is going to fund us for a second trip in September to implement greywater reuse systems in communities around Lake Atitlan. So, for the two months in between we have to prepare. The Phase I of the P3 proposal (the specific phase we passed) is giving us $15,000 to test the banana ring mulch basin technology. We are going to be optimizing a greywater reuse system while also writing a report for Phase II of the EPA's P3 award process. In April, we travel to Washington DC to showcase our optimal system to a panel of judges. If the report and showcase are selected, we will receive $90,000 dollars for full-scale implementation of the system. This is an exciting time....

Tomato greenhouses in village agriculture fields Life is unreliable in Nepal. Roads are either in poor condition or don’t exist at all, electricity shuts off for several hours every day due to load shedding, and labor strikes or protests can shut down transit for an entire day. This makes activities hard to plan. I recently arrived in Nepal for the first time to work on a seed saving project with Professor Kent Bradford’s partner organizations, the Center for Environmental and Agricultural Policy Research, Extension, and Development (CEAPRED) and International Development Enterprises (iDE). My first field visit with CEAPRED was planned the night before and day of our departure. I came with a bag packed, not knowing if we would stay the night or where I would sleep if we did. Village goats and cattle When we drove out of Kathmandu and into the nearby Kavre district, it became clear that we would not reach our demonstration site. After 1.5 hours of driving on dirt roads, th...