Marcovia Update: 7/99
Don Stierman's Report
Updated 05/08/06

Photos taken on July 19, 1999.

Renacer Marcovia: green grass, green trees, lots of roofless buildings cover what was a dry, dusty cow pasture last March.  Progress is being made.  There are quite a few houses with roofs, even some with windows and doors installed!

Workers are scarce despite the volume of work left to be completed.  One man sets blocks in an almost finished wall.  We helped dig the trenches for footings under some of these structures.  So much has changed that it is difficult to locate places we knew so well only 4 months earlier!

The row of sticks running from the left foreground toward the photo center are meant to protect trees planted in a reforestation effort.  Shade is a good idea in Renacer Marcovia, as are windbreaks, and trees will provide both - if they grow.  I suspect that cows will eat these saplings as soon as the grass is gone come the end of the wet season.

Columns for the front overhang are up and the beams for the roof are partially installed, while next door the castillos rust away above footings without a foundation.

Roofs are on this row of new homes, but many still lack floors, windows and doors.

Women carrying shovels, probably to make mezcla for floors, or perhaps for that wall going up left center of photo.  A window is being installed in the house left center.

The park is to the left.  Sticks mark locations where trees have been planted.

Water tanks filled from a water wagon continue to supply residents with drinking water.  This is about where out tents were located in March of 1999 - quite a change!

Las Peñitas families still live in tents as of July, 1999.  Houses have been assigned, but most lack doors, windows, and/or floors.  Latrines are more abundant but smaller (single occupancy).  Low-permeability clay soil prevents drainage after runoff from heavy rain fills the pits with water.  

Lots of work remains to be done.

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