Other Projects

In other news, we just received around $8000 USD from the European Union to build a cyclone safe classroom for Ian Livo Primary School near Kerepua Community, construction should begin late May or early June.

Kerepua Village Community Church Building Project

The Warren Wilson College Presbyterian Congregation and a private individual donated $3000 USD to help Kerepua Village try to finish their Presbyterian Church. Kerepua has been trying to finish this church building for over five years now and their funds are completely exhausted. This funding has been used to purchase cement to plaster over the block walls, timber for the ceiling supports, window frames, doors, cyclone shutters, and door frames, louver glass and frames, and some basic hand tools. All this equipment had been delivered in June of 2007, and at the time, the villagers moved a few tons of sand one bucket at a time from the beach, up the steep hill to the church. Unfortunately, not much has happened since. The village has been very busy completing the public water supply, and then everything typically stops from Dec. till Feb. because of the oppressive heat and humidity of cyclone season. They are also waiting for help from a carpenter in the village of Tasariki to come and assist them, as they have never built a building except out of woven bamboo. Even all this taken into account, they should be farther along, I hope to have a better report the next time the current Peace Corps Volunteer gets to a computer.

Kerepua Village Community Store

The Kerepua Community Store was completed back in May of 2007 and last I heard is still functioning well. What was once a dark and dingy closet barely stocked and full of rats and an undisclosed amount of money in a bag is now a large, free standing store with some semblance of business hours, a diverse stock of goods, and probably a slightly less amount of rats. Three store employees have been trained in basic book keeping and the store is now a source of community pride. Everyone in the village seemed happy with the 20% of our total sales going to support the church, water supply maintenance, and the Development Committee. The corrupt image of the store has gone by the wayside as people are seeing the benefits of a properly managed store and people are no longer hiking 45 minutes to Elia Village to spend money at their community cooperative.