HEALTH AND SANITATION
renovated the existing toilet facilities in one of the
buildings at SDN Cicau 02, increasing the number of
toilets from two to four; built a new hand-washing area
outside the renovated toilets; installed two new elevated
water tanks for improved water supply; and installed a
new wastewater system.
“It was a lot of work, but everything came together really
well,” Stewart said. “The amount of work that was done
was really incredible under the conditions. It was hot,
really hot. It got to the point where guys were changing
shirts three times a day because they’re just wringing wet.
It was around 35°C, and with extreme humidity.”
Education also played a key role in CPC2017, as a
team representing IWSH collaborated with the Cikarang
District Health Clinic to present a Public Health
Awareness Showcase on 11 November. More than 100
local residents received free health check-ups, and
approximately 65 prescriptions were given out for various
medical conditions.
Dr Aria Sarlito, who volunteered to participate in the
showcase, taught visiting children about proper hand-
washing stages and using soap for hygiene. He reminded
them that people’s hands touch many objects that may
contain germs, and that proper hand-washing removes
dirt and kills germs that can cause illness. He said
hand-washing steps were explained in a very interesting
manner and songs were used to make it easy for children
to remember.
Saralaya, who has also worked with Healthabitat’s Nepal
Sanitation Studio in addition to previous Community
Plumbing Challenges, said working with the various
communities continues to help develop not only the
cultural awareness around hygiene practices, but — more
importantly — behavioural aspects when it comes to
sanitation.
“These exercises and activities are an important step in
building up a better understanding of, and friendship with,
a host community,” she said, “and they also increase
awareness about the health impacts of poor sanitation.”
While Stewart was in the middle of the construction
activity working with the tradespeople, Kearney was off-
site handling media operations, including highlight videos
for social media and training videos that can help local
and international students.
“We worked with two senior mentors involved with the
international team to create some basic overview videos
that introduce plumbing topics for students; for example,
www.plumbingafrica.co.za
31
‘What is Wastewater Drainage?’, ‘What is Pipefitting?’”
Kearney said. “We think resources like this — recorded
in context, on site, from the heart of our Community
Plumbing Challenge projects — could become very useful
as the programme continues to grow, not just in Indonesia
but other parts of the world. So, we will look forward to
releasing these videos in 2018 and making them available
online and via social media.”
The US participants on the Construction Week
international team were Vinny Falkowski of ASPE;
Mark Hensley of Pan-Pacific Mechanical and UA Local
398; Randy Lorge of Fox Valley Technical College and
UA Local 400 in Appleton, Wisconsin; Chris Macias
of Pan-Pacific Mechanical and UA Local 78; and Rick
Winter of UA Local 78. Anthony Flores of Pan-Pacific
Mechanical and UA Local 398, and Nicholas Hipp of
ASPE participated in Design Week. Winter, a plumbing
supervisor for the Los Angeles Department of Water
and Power, is also an instructor for UA Local 78. He
said he had never participated in such a project and
jumped at the opportunity after seeing photos and
videos of previous events. In addition to mentoring
some of the younger participants in Indonesia, Winter
said he helped with excavating the area where the
piping was going to be laid and then installing the
piping and plumbing.
He said in addition to the weather, one of the biggest
challenges for the Americans was using the metric system
for all of their measurements.
“That was a challenge to get used to, plus working around
all of the students in an active school, and being able to
make safe certain areas that we were working in that
couldn’t have students in them at various times during
the day.”
Winter said his brief time as a Los Angeles Unified School
District employee through the UA, as well as the education
he received through the UA Training Trust Fund, helped
prepare him for his role in CPC2017.
“I thought that helped a lot; being able to share that
with the vocational students that we worked with on the
project, and being able to fill a mentorship role with them
regarding the plumbing,” he said. “Not just doing the
work, but explaining to them why the work is performed
in a certain manner and in a certain way, and what the
benefits are to doing the plumbing in that fashion or that
manner by those codes. I felt that the training I received
from the UA to be an instructor, as well as the training
to be a plumber, really helped me to do that during this
project in Indonesia.”
“These exercises
and activities
are an important
step in building
up a better
understanding
of, and friendship
with, a host
community,
but they also
increase
awareness
about the health
impacts of poor
sanitation.”
Continued on page 32 >>
March 2018 Volume 24 I Number 1