Leaky roofs

It's really no fun sleeping under a leaky roof. We had that experience once at the home stay, back when the roofs were still made of palm leaves. It was quite a miserable and stressful night trying to avoid all that constant erratic dripping.

But many of the villagers live with even worse leaks. The palm leaf thatches, though functional, do not last long. Many homes have various degrees of roof leakiness.

This widow and her kids live in a very small hut just off the main highway leading out of Baray village, - a hut with a badly decayed and damaged roof. Everything about the house was almost falling apart, including the wooden front stepst. The NTU students (Project L.O.V.E.) were supposed to construct a new zinc roof for her home. When we were getting acquainted with her, it was obvious she was moved almost to tears at the prospect of being able to get a new roof for her house. As it transpired, the students were not allowed to climb up to the roof as the scaffolding was badly decayed and we were concerned for the students' safety. Then later we realized that the supplied amount of zinc sheets were inadequate. Happily, two Ngee Ann Poly lecturers were visiting at the same time, and coming to know of the students' plight, chipped in and donated money to purchase the additional zinc sheets. Later, the students having chipped in themselves to fund the reconstruction of another house, offered some of that money to reconstruct the steps leading up to the house.

All in all, it worked out well and we had one very happy widow and her family.