Ann has been very interested in working abroad for a long time. Before we met I had been interested in working in Canada (specifically Toronto) and had tried to get a placement in CNIB but unfortunately it didn’t work out at the time. Working abroad gives you the time to really experience a country and gain new experiences whilst still doing the work you love! However Ann has other ideas about working abroad that I hadn’t really thought of. She would like to go to places in the world to help those that are less fortunate than her and having already been to Peru on a water project she is keen to do more. In contrast, I hadn’t really thought about this sort of work since I feel that my day to day work is about enabling people to do things which they couldn’t do before. So when Ann suggested a weekend away to get a taste of her kind of overseas work I said yes without the faintest idea what I was getting into. The weekend was an awareness course entitled “So you want to be a refugee?” organised by RedR which is a charity that specialises in sending engineers to emergency situations to help the people of that region. I had never heard of the charity but decided to go to support Ann and because it sounded like a bit of fun for not a lot of expense.
The start of something challenging…..
Like Ann, I hadn’t really read the material that was being sent in the knowledge that Ann is usually really good at this sort of thing and that I would be briefed in the car. I had looked at the list of things needed and got those so at least we were prepared.
Friday night was spent in on a farm a few miles outside Tiverton. Some of the other participants were staying in tents but we opted for the barn. It was cold, but we were in sleeping bags and on an air bed so it wasn’t so tough and at least it was dry! Saturday morning was cold and wet but hot sweet tea soon kicked things into gear. More people arrived whilst we got ourselves ready. In total we had 21 people from mainly Black and Veatch; and a few students from Exeter University; however most except me and couple of others were engineers.
Saturday…a day of extremes
We all went into the barn and were given an introduction by Robert Hodgson from RedR, and Anne-Marie from Black and Veatch who helped co-ordinated the event. They gave us a run down of activities for Saturday and Sunday and only then did we start to realise what we were in for. After the introduction we were given the first task: You are all refugees, in groups go out into the fields and pick a spot to build a shelter. Please leave all useful equipment, mobile phones, knives here. People and supplies may appear after midday but don’t count on it.
So in our newly formed group of four, we started out into the fields, with groups to the left and right of us we quickly headed down to the bottom of the field and across a stream to the left to find a nice flat piece of land that seemed quite sheltered from the wind. So we set up camp. Stupidly had we gone round the corner of a huge bramble bush we would have seen a much nicer place but you live and learn. With that it started to rain. As we were so close to the next group we formed an alliance with them..
With people starting to gather what resources were available (wood and logs) we started collecting them as well so we could build a shelter. Two of our four went off to explore the region. Probably in hindsight it might not have been the greatest idea as we were short on numbers to collect and build. We soon realised that actually are location wasn’t as great as we thought but we ploughed on and started building a wooden frame shelter from the available resources. It was coming on quite nicely and had just obtained a plastic cover from the UN (up at the farm) when we got a visit from Il Presidente; and his two henchmen. Unfortunately we made a mistake of letting their man get to close and he kicked in our shelter. They weren’t very happy to see us their and we were less than impressed. It then started to rain – a theme was setting in here. In comparison Ann’s team was doing much better. They had found a really secure area for their site, had erected their shelter really quickly and had received fire assistance really quickly which meant they got to eat most of their food parcel from the UN.
We took the knock and bounced back. We changed our shelter design so we could keep dry and with a little help from our neighbouring refugees and some dry wood and matches from Il Presidente as a gift. Seems he wasn’t all bad 
With the fire came food, our spirits soared. Our neighbours joined us for food, as did the Oxfam representative, the Merlin representative and finally Il Presidente. It seemed our luck had changed. One of the bandits tried to sabotage our shelter but this time it was secure. Soon after we finished eating we completed the exercise and all returned to the barn for a de-brief and a bbq. Thankfully Robert made a huge fire as well so it provided us with an opportunity to get dry and warm through!
Sunday….a day of new horizons and reflections
Sunday started cold, even though I was thoroughly buried in my sleeping bag. Once up and about we had a skype call with one of the teams out in Bangladesh that are heavily involved in house building projects. The call was really interesting as we learnt more about the situation out in Bangladesh and the house building process. In short, houses are built out of “organic” materials, such as bamboo. These houses generally last about 8-10 years although they can last longer if the bamboo is treated. As bamboo takes around 7 years to grow to a point of maturity it means that there is generally a shortage of bamboo. In this particular situation the team had a good supply of materials, adding their construction process. The Bangladeshi team were interested to hear about our construction methods. The biggest difference being the UK uses specialised house building teams whilst in Bangladesh, the whole village gets involved in house building.
After the call, we split up into teams again to do some more tasks, this time less demanding and being guided by the experts. Ann and I both chose the shelter building session followed by the aerial supply transport session. There was a water treatment session but we chose to do the others because Ann had done water treatment work during the course of her degree and work. The aerial support was the most challenging because we had to make a system to transport supplies across an imaginary river. As the tallest person, I had to “swim” across a pretend river and tie the main rope down. Simple, yes, except I don’t do knots. I should know how, but I just fail at knots. Anyway my knots held as we got the supplies across after plenty of assistance from the experts.
The whole weekend certainly showed us that we lack key survival skills which if Ann and I continue to travel they way we do or take up a role with RedR will be needed. The weekend was an awareness and taster session and it certainly made us aware of our lack of skills and also whet our appetite for relief work.
The weekend continues….
After packing up the materials and heading back for a final session in the barn, it was time to leave Low Beer as our time had come to an end. It had been a fantastic weekend but both of us were shattered. Fortunately we had taken the Monday off work thinking that we’d like to stay in the area to do some exploring. We headed down to Exeter, not down the obvious M5 but down one track roads (thanks to our satellite navigation) but we got to see a lot of countryside. We found a lovely little place using lastminute.com just south of Exeter run by Chinese people. We were right next to Powderham Castle which we explored the next day. Afterwards we went into Exeter to wander around a few shops before I dropped Ann off at the train station. Coincidentally I was needed in Exeter by work so I was staying but Ann needed to get back so we parted at the station where the 5pm train for London Paddington took Ann away and ended our fantastic weekend.
