Around this time last year, we arrived on the deserted beach of John Obey with the dream of building a sustainable community from scratch. We had no idea what to expect, it had never been done here before and international tourists had hardly been flocking to Sierra Leone since the civil war. Through many trials and tribulations -- and nine months of life changing experiences -- we succeeded: A hundred international visitors joined our sustainable community, sleeping in tents until our earth-domes and local wood bungalows were finished.
We worked together, ate local food together, cleaned together and played together with our team and neighbors from John Obey. When we closed for the rainy season, I wrote that the real test would be the test of time. Would the community we built endure the ravaging thunderstorms and the rains that would likely beat down for 90 days straight? Would the local team look after our newly built community? Would the earth-domes be flooded? Would the solar panels still be there when we returned?
After a three month hiatus, we returned as promised to John Obey beach. We were pleasantly surprised.
The local team of 20, lead by Ibrahim Fatorma, has really taken ownership of the project, not only have they been doing maintenance on the earth-domes, kitchen and compost toilets, but they have begun building a new earth-dome structure: "The Wall". This time around, without the guidance of Cal-Earth architect Hooman Fazly, who spent nine months in Sierra Leone last season training the workers on sustainable architecture. This time, our "earth team" has taken the initiative: "The Wall" is being shaped in a gentle curve, built with local earth packed in rice bags, complete with three private alcoves that will accommodate tribe-members.
More importantly, the earth-bagging technique is slowly being adopted at John Obey village outside of Tribewanted. The new village cinema was the first to build its walls using this technique, to protect it from the floods.
Our permaculture gardens have blossomed with the rains, the banana trees in front of the compost toilets are now taller than the building itself, complements of the nitrogen rich tribe-members' urine!
The gardens, which had been fertilized with our compost at the end of the dry season, are now beginning to flourish with pineapples, carrots, okra, peppers, tomatoes, pawpaw, eggplant and lemongrass for tea. Coconut palm saplings have taken root and flowers are blossoming. It took us one year to rebuild the soil, but we are finally starting to see some results.
Our inverter for the solar panels had died on us in late May due to poor underground wiring in the bush (lesson learned), so we brought back a new one from New York. Our local solar expert installed it successfully and, after three off-season months of darkness, we have power again.
We realized, however, that the rain has tampered with the wires below ground and we will have to replace lots of them, taking more care in insulating them.
Our rainwater catchments were effective, and we have full 500 to 5,000 liter tanks on the property; plenty of water for the coming dry months. The water well has survived the heavy rains losing only 4 cm in depth over the last 6 months, and volunteer hydrologist Karl concluded that it is in good shape.
This year the project will be managed more fully by the community, and while Ben and I will only stay a couple of months a year, the local team is now leading the day to day operations. One of our tribe-members, Kat Cacavas, from Australia, has volunteered to be our eyes and ears on the ground for a semester. Kat is a nutritionist and will be working with our kitchen team to increase the focus on nutrition, hygiene and food variety in our "Chop house." First matter at hand: decrease the amount of palm oil used to cook.
Out of the 50 microloans we distributed at John Obey last March, 49 have been paid back on time, a 98 percent repayment rate, better than any US bank I know!
Over the summer we renegotiated our goodwill contracts with the community, with the hope that more money would truly go towards specific community projects. Together with the Headman (the local chief), we decided to split all contributions between education, an elders fund, youth initiatives and community development projects, such as a dam, forestry training and a tree nursery.
Last year we succeeded in being sustainable: energy wise, growing and sourcing local fruits, vegetables and fresh fish, recycling water, composting and employing many local fishermen. We were 80 percent of the way there to being financially sustainable. This year, the goal is to get 200 tribemembers to come get their hands dirty on the best beach in West Africa, so that we can re-invest all the profits in more community development and prove that sustainable living is possible!
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