WATER BOTTLE HOUSE

Today, Sister Rosemary came to Cornerstone to fetch me for our trip to see a house made of water bottles. When she arrived, I invited her downstairs where we had some tea. I am so glad I did because a boy working at Cornerstone, Javis, recognized Sister Rosemary from her time at Cornerstone with PFA last year and was overjoyed to see her again. He said he admired her deeply for all the good that she does and hopes that he can come to Gulu to help her at St. Monica’s with IT since he just graduated with his IT degree from MaKerere University. We had a fun conversation reminiscing on their experience with the pros, like Adrian Peterson, coming last spring. Very good start to the day.

Next, we met with Stephen with Butakoola Village Association for Development (www.buvad.org) who has constructed the first water bottle house in Uganda. He explained that this idea originated in India about 9 years ago and provides a cost-effective, environment friendly alternative to bricks. Sister Rosemary heard about this project last week, searched it online, arranged with Stephen to see it first hand, and is organizing an instructional workshop in Gulu by the end of the month.... this lady does not run on Africa time!! I like her style. Her goal is to have a two room building constructed before the PFA trip in March; the building will function as a show room for the girls’ jewelry and clothing that they produce at the school.

The house is located in Kayunga town about an hour outside of Kampala. The drive was a perfect opportunity for me to see a wide range of Uganda. Kampala is the capital and is decently modernized. The roads in Kampala are not marked with lines or many signs, and people will be manufacturing bed and couches on the side of the road. Ugandans just make life happen without the fuss of rules and regulations. It is an interesting concept. As you continue heading farther out of town life becomes more basic with dirt roads, livestock wandering, people walking the road carrying baskets on their heads, and kids playing in the dirt with tires and sticks.

The water bottle house was located even farther out in the countryside. We traveled off of the main dirt road along a side road to the final destination. It was a school and also the home of the water bottle project. The water bottles are packed tight with moist soil and then stacked upon one another held together with cement. It is the same concept of brick buildings without the fumes and allows the use a resource that is readily available all over the side of roads in Uganda, plastic water bottles. Filling the bottles with soil is a task that even children can master and does not present a potential danger such a fumes and the heat of fusing bricks. Sister Rosemary and I were amazed by the quality of insulation that the water bottle walls provided. The walls were very cool to the touch and were definitely stable. Water bottle housing is an innovative technique to providing low cost housing and environment management.