Author: Trudy Rilling-Collins

The rain was pouring down and huge puddles, virtually small lakes of water were forming all over the streets for much of the day. Sydney and the entire team made the most of the moment to play in the rain, splash in the puddles and dance in the street! After the rain abated slightly Syd was teaching a young woman from Dharavandhoo to swim. The joy on the woman’s face was incredible to see and in that moment a women’s life changed! A whole new world opened up to her, a world of joyful exploration. At times our project is about far more than just controlling mosquitoes, it is about building cultural bridges and communicating person to person, about bringing joy into communities and helping to bring people together. Thanks Sydney for all of the special skills, enthusiasm and joy you bring to this project!

 

 

Only have two days left to wrap up the project on Eydhafushi, and it look like everything is coming together. Piggie, Mark, Trudy and I along with Mohammed and some Maldivian volunteers successfully cleared off all the trash from last saturdays cleanup (1000 + bags in less than an hour). Had a great turnout today with all the kids showing up and we now have 3 local kids starting to lead groups for mosquito control independently (which is great for the sustainability part of the project). With Trudy finding funding for supplies in the future, all that is left to do is finish training the local kids and finish surveying the island!

Tomorrow will be the final day of working with Maalhos followed by a community clean up on Friday. The community here has been great, welcoming us right away and working with us to get the children as well as other adults of the community involved in the project. With everyone’s help were finished up the survey of homes yesterday and used today to trek through the dense jungle that surrounds the island looking for mosquito breeding in tree holes and coconut shells. We stumbled onto a few gravestones in the process that are at least a century old. After lunch we had the school kids come out to help us re-survey a few homes and they seemed to enjoy it and said they would be back for more tomorrow. Community health officers have mentioned that they would like to involve the older children in keeping the project going once we leave the island and I really do think they’ll be able to carry on with mosquito control once we’re gone. Definitely looking forward to two more days on the island and hopefully seeing  a great turnout on Friday.

Well this island is shaping up to be a toughy, but working with the health center and the school have been  encouraging. The 6th and 7th graders we have been working with sure get the job done, and make it fun! They recharge our batteries after sweaty mornings, and helped us find refreshment diving in the ocean today. Swimming today had to be the highlight, if only because the island gets sweltering.

Last day of survey here tomorrow! We might actually finish, with a little help from our friends.

The team has definitely made a lot of progress on Eydhafushi over the course of the last week. We have surveyed about 3/5 of the whole island and have proven to the community that their is a ton mosquito breeding occurring all over the place, even at the hospital where all dengue fever patients are brought for the Baa Atoll.   That being said, we have seen a lot of community support. After presenting at the school, 250 kids from k-12 and their parents showed up to the trash cleanup on Saturday (we were expecting only around 40 people) and we filled more than 700 concrete bags with trash and recyclables. Even though this is quite an impressive feat there is still a lot  more trash on the beaches that needs to be cleaned up, and hopefully the local community will make more of an effort to do something about it after seeing what they are capable of doing.We have also been getting a group of amazing kids that join our survey groups in the afternoon to learn how to fight mosquitoes! This is really crucial because it makes the sustainability part of our project have a chance at becoming a reality. With only three days left on Eydhafushi there is still a lot of work to do, but we have definitely made progress to make this a sustainable project for the future!