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state of the project January 2014

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state of the project

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state of the project

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state of the project

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state of the project

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state of the project

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the state of the project last year

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state of the project last year

Sunday, December 20, 2009

Engagement – Participation – Sustainability – Tour ’09 (the results)

The Report of the first Workshop Meeting in Tubatse 3. to 7. December 2009.

3. December 2009:
Arrival of Kathi and Henning (both from Humana Austria) together with Dustin (the architect) was celebrated with a really warm welcome and a great singing from all the staff members of Child Aid Tubatse under the guidance of Nondumiso and assisted by Angie (from Humana South Africa) and the volunteer Nam (from South Korea) who was working on computer training and a differentiated waste system as well as being friend to the kids from the close by families.
















Meeting with Humana Staff was set as the first meeting, originally planned for 10 in the morning, but due to our late arrival only happened at 2 pm, to be followed by the second appointment at 3 pm, the meeting with Community Representatives, three priests, two youth leaders, one community developer to discuss the process of the coming two workshop days and what we should envisage to achieve: well it was clear that we all gathered to talk about a community centre, but the how and who was to be defined.
















At first the idea of the community being the actual designers, builders, enablers and eventually the ones that should profit of the project gave us a lot of questioning looks, but as we moved on and through the ‘idea of a two storey structure we made the real difference’ and we really had the community representatives on board.
The tension for the second day, the actual workshop day, was rising!

4. December 2009:
















Workshop Day 1 started an hour late to allow the more than sixty members of the community and the Humana staff to come to the building site where a tent was set up to run the workshop. The idea for the first day was to start a process of Mapping of the Community.
















At first we explained the way we wanted to envisage the realisation of the centre as a process of engagement and participation for a sustainable project. The focus in this entire process was based on a model for a buttom-uo procedure that was based on the aspect of giving ownership and responsibility to the community from the first moment on and to have the community also directly involved in the designing and building phase.
















The community members where divided in five groups, three male age groups and two female and the where asked to develop graphic elaborations of the community by analysing the needs and the possibilities, by focussing on local materials and skills, the resources and the waste within the community and the availability, the distance to the site and other aspects that could be of significance as we ‘whities’ from Europe did not know anything of all this
What we understood for the community project was that each group had real commitment, and with great serious engagement, they drew ‘plans’ in very different methods (see the posting of these maps) that will enable everybody to know who and where to find the skilled members to involve in the building, but also where to find sand, stones, gravel, grass, empty glass bottles, branches and other materials or ‘waste’ that could be eventually used for the building.
















In the evening we defined a timeline for the project and the realisation, as well as the workshops needed during building up to the official opening, which was defined to take place on 1. December 2010 (World Aids Day).
Phase one was started , the second phase, workshop week 2 is planned to take place in February 2010, with the foundation to be realised then and then the third phase to take place from August to October 2010 with the actual building taking place, leaving the month of November for landscaping and final preparations for the big opening.

5. December 2009:
Workshop Day 2 was started with reduced tension, as the ice was broken the day before, and today was a more creative phase to begin, the layout of the community centre as such.
The Workshop was today focussed on the site, the qualities as shade of the trees, but also the direction of wind and weather, being often a real problem in this part of the country, as well as the formulation of shaded space as the sun was a real challenge in Tubatse.
















The requirements of the original brief where verified, the office space, the teaching space, the library and computer room, as well as the kitchen and the big hall. It emerged that library and computers where better if separated, as the two functions could not happen contemporary, so we decided to augment the original two 50 square meter spaces to three with 40 square meters each. We had a long discussion on the positioning of the new kitchen facility and also the existing building to accept the existing building as part of the project and the kitchen in the northeast angle of the envisaged setting.
















The setting was a big U-shape that opens southwards with a beautiful courtyard like open area for venues to happen on the premises. The buildings are spread in an arch around this open space wit the library being a second floor unit above the computer room and the big hall for 120 people being a space with a sloping ceiling, from the double volume to a single storey building height at the southern end. The two halves of the complex will be covered with two distinct roof structures generating lots of shadow in the court yard, but also having the necessary offset to protect from sun and rain on the north-western corner. With great enthusiasm the community got involved in the building of a model that was then discussed after completion with everybody and used to also start envisaging material qualities as well as structural ideas.























During the realisation of the model, Nam was involved in the realisation of a test solar cooker, a cardboard box with a mirror that reflects the sun into the black painted interior covered with a glass panel that heats up the air at the interior up to some 250 – 300 degrees, able to cook almost anything, even if our experiment didn’t work, as the mirror was only aluminium foil and the pot was aluminium coloured and didn’t heat up enough to cook the spinach on the inside.
The final part of workshop day two was the definition of the name. A series of ideas where set up, and after a final round of discussions we went to the voting and “CAT – Child Aid Tubatse” emerged as the best name for the community centre.


6. December 2009:

















Our forlast day in Tubatse started with a big shopping tour to get the necessary food and drinks to celebrate the Sunday with an early braai, good music and some final considerations between the various community members and the European visitors.

7. December 2009:
















The defined project elements: (the dimensions are approximations!)

Office (exist building) 40 m2, this will be integrated into the new skills centre,
Office 40 m2, space for 3 to four work settings,
Teaching 40 m2, for classes and computer courses,
Library 40 m2, a second floor unit , open view on the surrounding,
Kitchen 20 m2, big enough to serve the new centre,
Toilets 2 male, 2 female toilets and a shower for each, plus sinks,
Hall 120 m2, a big enclosed space for 100 people,
Security 15 m2, a security room near to the entrance,

Roof
providing shade a weather protection,
Courtyard an open space within the structure for events,
Vegetable garden the relocation of the vegetable garden due to the new building,

Engagement – Participation – Sustainability – Tour ’09 (the program)

A - What is the main goal?
B - How will we go about it?
C - What will happen in the two workshop days?
D - Questions and what are the needs?



A - What is the main goal?


The idea is to develop, compile, plan, finance and realize a community centre, on the basis of coachings and workshops, together with the community concerned. Local resources and skills should be the main motor used, developed and strengthened.
This means a course of action, which depends less on investment and travel expenses from European partners rather than more responsibility and inclusion for and of the target community, in which the local project management and competencies are residing, with the main focus on capacity building, the process of developing skills, which will be implemented by the community.
The goal is to implement a Community Centre within the framework of the Child Aid Project Tubatse in the province Limpopo/South Africa.
The building will comprise an area of 250 - 300 m2 and should fulfil the following functions:
• Assembly hall for 100 persons – with a required floor space of 120 m2.
• 2 training classrooms – each needs 50 m2. The first room acts as the “communications centre” with computers, TV, radio, books, magazines and internet access. The second room will be used as the productions centre, where sewing as well as meetings and trainings for 20 people will take place.
• An office – this room with ca. 40 m2 is at the disposal of the Child Aid team and will be used for administrative purposes.
• Kitchen and toilet: these rooms with ca. 40 m2 will need the necessary infrastructure.
• Outdoor shade: a space for social events, workshops and an eating area.
The whole project structure will be realized with local building materials, taking into account costs, efficiency and transport. The involvement of the community makes the manufacturing of local building components (i.e. clay bricks) possible and shows the will for involving the people. Child Aid staff and local volunteers will actively implement the project.
Currently there exists a well and a small building on the property. The latter is used as storage room and housing space for the project workers. Planned parallel to the building is a 0,5 ha big vegetable garden.
The topic of sustainable energy will be covered through solar energy, as there are app. 250 days sunshine a year in South Africa. Additionally, the alignment of the building copes with the approach: the active solar energy (which counts twice as much compared to Austria) will be used and alternative concepts (i.e. solar cookers, water heating systems and natural active cooling system) are supposed to make the whole project self-sufficient.
The idea of the Coaching Model for a project of the International Development Cooperation is based on the local resources, skills and available manpower.The main focus lies on the right motivation, a good idea and the realization of an exciting project in Tubatse.
On the basis of two accomplished projects and a third in process, I have experienced what it means to work with ca. 25 students from Europe for 6 to 7 weeks building a complete Skills Centre (ca. 350 m2), the Lesedi Nhahle Crèche and a kindergarten trainings centre (420 m2).

This project is not focussed on the work performance of voluntary students from Europe but rather the aspect of capacity building within the local community.The topic Coaching will work within 3 phases and the different tools applied on-site refer to the Transdisciplinary Design Framework.

a. identification and structuring:
compiling programme, mapping resources, workshop of acknowledgement, 1:1 simulation, name finding
b. analysis: planning workshop, skills programme, resources, 1:1 model, memo of understandings
c. from results to implementation: beginning of construction, workteam workshops, skillswork, planning discussions, ownership workshops.

There will be planning phases in between the different design or work states, for which I will develop a handbook of implementation on open-source basis, so that future projects have a manual orientation.

The goal is to develop an ecologically self-sufficient structure based on local resources, whereas the project will be supported by all partners of my network: S.L.U.M_network5, the Global Village Network6 and the Peace and Collaboration Development Network.

B - How will we go about it?

Workshops, planning phase, building phase, experiment, implement, document, hand over, open source, manual.

C - What will happen in the two workshop days?
The basic idea is to focus in the entire process on the concept of ‘need-based-design’, standing for the application of ‘appropriate technologies’ for real sustainability.
Day one: assessment of skills, resources, materials, etc;
Day two: the project outline, with final sketches and a model, and a name!!
We will divide the community in 6 groups, female – male and then in three age groups, and each group will individually develop ‘solutions’ and the relevant information for each step.
The actual ‘mapping’ will happen when each group will draw a ’map’ indicating the availability and distances from/to the actual building site of each and every aspect, without forgetting the essentials of:

Culture,
Ecology,
Technology,
Politics,
Economics,
Community,
Spiritual means

and the result of all this will be developed into the project of the Community Centre that we want to realise together!

C.1 – WORKSHOP-DAY ONE:

C.1.1. - SKILLS:
What skills do we find around the premises?
Who can do what?
How do we find them?
Who is in contact with?
What facilities can we find?

- brick-layers, brick-makers, tire repairs, car wash, exhaust pipe welders, car mechanics, machine makers, electricians, plumbers, doctors, teachers, architects, designers, web-designers, bloggers, farmers, artists, potters, video, grass matt makers, grass furniture makers, etc.

C.1.2. - MATERIALS:

What can we use for building?
What natural materials are found?
What artificial materials are found?
What waste can be re-used/re-cycled?
In what condition are the things we find?

- clay, sand, stone, grass, branches, trees, wood, timber, glass, bottles, paper, cardboard, metal, plastic, water, sheeting, cloth, fabrics, net, shading, etc.

C.1.3. – RESOURCES and WASTE:
Waste is a resource and free.
Food, and everything natural is good for compost,
Glass bottles and plastic bottles, paper, cardboard, tin cans,
Plastic, other non reusable materials.

Where do we find what?
Energy supplies?
Where are the skills?
Where are the materials?
How do we link to the world?
How do we move skills and materials?
Where are the shops to buy what we don’t have?
How do we raise the money?

C.2. – WORKSHOP-DAY TWO:

C.2.1. - SITE:

What are the qualities of the site?
What is not so good on the site?
Where is the place with best shadow?
Where do you want to sit on the site?
What facilities do we want to find in the community centre?
What orientation does it need?
Do we have water or a well?
What are the ground qualities?
What can we do with the free space in-between?

C.2.2. – Project: All this will be developed in 6 groups and then each group will present their ideas, and we will then build a scale model of the centre in order to visualise our ideas in one single project outline, for which we will find a name that will symbolise the concept and the idea of what has been developed.

C.2.3. – Next steps:
Finally we will define the responsibilities as well as a clear working plan, so that when we meet again in 3-4 months we can proceed in starting the second phase and eventually realise the building!

D - Questions and what are the needs?



“Engagement in a common idea,
participation of all involved,
to realise a really sustainable project.”

Tuesday, December 15, 2009

The Patrons to the Project
























Engagement – Participation – Sustainability – Tour ’09

The concept for the first workshop in Tubatse, based on the coaching idea, envisages 5 days in Tubatse.

Arrival in Tubatse (coming from Haenertsburg) on Wednesday, 2.12.2009

Leaving Tubatse (for Jo’burg) on Monday, 7.12.2009

This leaves us with 5 days for working:

- the dates in the program are interchangeable until now, and want to indicate the time needed, but I hope in Nondumiso’s skill to define the best days for each step.

- we envisage

– one day for definition of program, meeting of stakeholders, etc

- two days for the ‘mapping workshop’ with all the community. Up to 80 people can/should participate. Day one: assessment of skills, resources, materials, etc; day two: the project outline, with final sketches and a model, and a name!!

- two days for internal assessment, a next steps plan, and visits to local communal institutions, shops, service facilities, etc

- the definition of what happens on what day is as I said open, and I would want to verify which two days will suit best for the mapping workshops, as we need some 80 members of the community to take part, for two days, is it fine to use Friday and Saturday??

- I would then use Sunday for an internal assessment day, nd a braai with all the community??? to celebrate the beginning of the project.

- requirements for the workshop and how this can be developed.

- we need six flip charts if possible, as we will devide the community members in six groups: ladies, gentlemen and then each in three age groups, so that we have six different teams that will work.

- I guess we will be working a total of 6 hours, three in the morning, three in the afternoon, as to really work out all the information necessary and available! Looking forward to start this thrilling project,

Dustin

Vienna, 24.10.2009