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Building in Braga

By Marcia Blackmon

In October 2003, HfHOC volunteer Marcia Blackmon worked on a half-built concrete home in northern Portugal with ten other volunteers from the U.S. and Canada. Following are some of the memorable highlights of her experience there.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS

"Oh-truh vaysh!" Gaspar's voice rang out from an adjoining room. It was my first ten minutes of Global Village work in Braga, Portugal, and I was holding one end of a very long, thin opaque plastic tube filled with water - and wondering why. By pointing and waving "Come here!," the construction supervisor had picked me to help him. He knew no English, and I, no Portuguese. Gesturing vigorously and smiling, he pointed to a chalk mark on the concrete kitchen wall, about 3 feet above the dirt floor, and showed me to hold the tube up to the wall, with the water level even with the mark. Dashing around the room with the other end of the tube, he marked each wall, then disappeared into the adjoining room.

Suddenly it dawned on me. Yes, water seeks its own level! While the water level at my end of the tube was at my chalk mark, Gaspar was marking the same level on the walls in the other rooms, using the water level at his end of the tube as a guide. After each "otra ves!" and when the bouncing water level had settled down at my end, I yelled "OK!," the universal word of assent, and he moved on. My limited knowledge of Spanish had saved my day. Although the Portuguese pronunciation is different, I realized he was yelling "another time!" to let me know that he'd moved to the next wall to make a new chalk mark.

Outside, my teammates were furiously shoveling sand and cement into buckets, feeding a hungry motor-driven mixer, then wheel-barrowing the wet cement inside. Gaspar had measured down from each chalk mark to indicate the level of the future concrete floor. As he worked on hands and knees, spreading and smoothing the "massa" (literal translation: "mush" , he began singing loudly and confidently, and his voice was strong and clear. My two-week GV adventure had begun.

"NO PROBLEMA!"

Our GV volunteer team soon discovered another universal term in our construction supervisor's response to our many mistakes - "No problema!" - which soon became the theme song of our two weeks of building in Portugal. No matter how badly or often we amateurs fouled up, Gaspar smiled resolutely and went to work to make things right again.

Our group was the fourth to be hosted by the Braga Habitat chapter, so the house was well along when we arrived in October. The 3-bedroom concrete structure is capped by the picturesque red-tiled roof that is common in Portugal. Set on a hillside off a suburban road, the house has a spectacular view from the kitchen, overlooking a valley of vineyards and orchards, and the Duoro River in the distance. Although the seasonal temperatures are similar to southern California's, the surrounding greenery and fresh air evidenced far more frequent rains.

What did we accomplish in our two-week stay? Our main jobs were to:

• Shovel sand, shovel cement, mix with water, and carry the wet concrete
• Pour and finish the concrete floors (lots of scraping and sweeping!)
• Build a 4" wide concrete front deck (and the supporting cement block walls)
• Pour 5" thick concrete lids for two septic tanks, set them in place, and shape them to fit with chisel and hammer
• Install drywall in the bathrooms and hallway
• Set large ceramic tiles on the walls and floors of two bathrooms and a large kitchen
• Sand interior walls for painting
• Scrape dried concrete off metal form boards, wheelbarrows, and tools
• Set brick-size tiles on a spacious patio
• Paint the exterior an alarming shade of green (chartreuse), several times

After working with wood-framed Habitat houses in the U.S., I was glad to learn the nitty-gritty about building with concrete - Mainly, it is gritty!

AWAY FROM WORK

In Portugal, our GV team took the bus to the work site every day. The public buses are clean, modern, and almost tokenless; most passengers use an electronic pass card. Boarding in the morning with backpacks and tool bags, we attracted some attention. But on our return ride every afternoon, in dirty work clothes splattered with paint and concrete and often bedraggled from working in the rain, we - particularly our women - attracted some frankly inquisitive stares from other passengers.

We were comfortably housed at a small hotel in the center of "old" Braga, a cobblestoned area closed off to cars, and one block from the historic cathedral (and its busy bell-ringers). Postcard and souvenir stores, pricy clothing shops, and food markets were just steps away. We were amused that the hotel had assigned all our women rooms on one floor, and the men, on another.

Our breakfasts were served continental style, with croissants, ham, cheese, and fruit. For lunch, we walked down the road a piece to a cafe, where we ate family-style. The fare was hearty dishes of pork, beef, or cod (a national obsession), accompanied by salad, soup (often with kale, another favorite), and ample portions of both rice and potatoes. A few adventurous diners in our group tried the pig ears and tripe, and ate the octopus and eels as well.

Each evening, after a hot shower or luxurious soak in the tub, we set out on foot for dinner, often not until 8:00, when most restaurants are just opening. We dined at restaurants, cafes, and a mall food court (where I was delighted by that rare European commodity - ice - in my soft drink). For the Portuguese, dessert is a requisite part of dinner, so we treated ourselves to flan, cheesecake, tortes, and tarts, and then reassured each other that we'd work off the calories the next day. And, in truth, we did.

OUR PORTUGUESE COUNTERPARTS

"Volunteerism" is uncommon in Portugal, so the Braga Habitat chapter depends more on visiting GV teams such as ours than on regular local crews. Our Habitat hosts were two lovely and extraordinary young women in their early 30s who are the backbone of the chapter. We were supported every day at the site by one of them, or by an equally extraordinary young man who is a recent college graduate and fellow volunteer. All three speak excellent English, so it was easy to converse and share cultures with them.

Especially memorable was Gaspar (our construction supervisor), who was visibly touched that our group had traveled across the world for Habitat. His eyes teared up not only at our end-of-the-trip dinner, but on our very first work day, when he delivered our morning prayer so fervently that it needed no translation.

Gaspar generously invited us to his home for tea after work one day. We were overwhelmed - not only with the invitation, but with his well-kept home, his outgoing family, and the tableful of home-baked cakes and other wondrous sweets that greeted us. We had known him as a small but sturdy man who labored energetically all day at our construction site. Now we saw a loving husband, a proud father of four delightful children, and an ingenious home improver.

He was particularly proud of an elegant spiral staircase that he had built to link one apartment with another, giving his eldest daughter private quarters upstairs. A university graduate, she spoke perfect English and translated for us enthusiastically. (We couldn't converse with his second oldest, because her second language is French; most of our team could speak only one language.) We came away gratified that such a loving and hard-working "common" man was able to enjoy life uncommonly well, as he so deserves.

Marcia Blackmon sweeping rain off the back deck, while Gaspar spreads wet cement and covers it with a tarp.

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