Kedesh Blog 3 - Daily work

I have included some photos taken during the time that I have been at Kedesh which should give you some of the work that I have been doing with the others here. Most of the time I have been involved in laying concrete blocks with Chris, another volunteer here at Kedesh, and Ito and Antonio, who both stayed at Kedesh when they were younger. I suppose that you could say that I have been working as a "brickie". I have learned a lot, is., how to mix a cement for the blocks, laying blocks in straight lines and also keeping each row vertical above the one below it, which is not as simple as it sounds. It has been great fun but also been hard work. Carrying 30 lb concrete blocks up ladders in temperatures over 25 deg is not easy work. Helps to reduce the waist line though.

So here are a few photos taken during the last 3-4 weeks during the building of the rear gable end wall on the new building.

The first job was to clear the tree vegetation that had grown over the top of the ground floor. This was done by Chris and Antonio. There was no problem in disposing of the cut branches and leaves. The cut branches were thrown down to the ground and the goats enjoyed themselves to a tasty snack. The bare branches that were left were chopped up and used for cooking the evening meal. All part of the recycling policy at Kedesh.

Chris and Antonio cutting away branches.

 

Goats eating the leaves

 

Chris and I then worked away at laying the concrete blocks. The photos show the work progressing.

Cementing blocks in place.

One of the two window openings.

Once we reached the height of the top of the windows we had to make our own concrete lintel beams. Both of these were made on site. The next photo shows Ito and Antonio cutting the reinforcing metal bars to the size that we needed. You can see that everything is done manually.

Cutting metal re-bar with a hand grinder.

The next photo shows the cut reinforced metal bar being made into the correct shape and length for one of the two lintels that we needed. In the photo are Heather, Chris, Ito and Antonio.

Making up the metal re-bar for one of the lintels.

The next photo shows one of the two the wooden box being put in place over the window opening ready for the concrete to be mixed and poured. The metal bar shown in the precious photo was placed inside the wooden box. The cement lintel mix was left to set and harden inside the wooden boxes for two weeks.

Putting the lintel box in place.

During this time the wood for the wooden roof trustees were delivered by trunk and unloaded by the boys. There was great excitement the day that the wood arrived. The wood was then cut to size and the wooden tresses made up.

 

Finally, today, Monday July 6th, the first of the four trusses needed to complete the quarters part of the new building was put in place. As you can see, it was all done manually. Cranes to lift the truss into place would have been a luxury. It was a case of " many hands make light work". There are 21 pairs of hands used to lift the truss into place.

Unfortunately, there is an alignment problem that will need to be rectified over the next few days to get the truss to fit properly. That hopefully will be not to difficult to resolve and the truss should be fitted in place in the next data or two.

 

 

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