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Monday, July 2, 2012

building a tukal part 1

Karimajong Power tools

So on the Echelon basecamp, otherwise known as Frontier Outpost 1 there are two ‘houses.’ These houses are nice and comfortable. There is also currently space for 3 small guest rooms. They have 2 twin beds a toilet and a sink and share an outdoor shower. There is also another Guest house that is currently being used by our friends the Schrocks. This is like a small open flat with a toilet and a sink and outdoor shower. Since we will be having more guests and even 2 new families coming to Uganda we are needing even more housing. 
Also, Once we get to Sudan we want to be prepared for building our own simple basecamp. We would like for the buildings to be made out of local materials and the houses to look like that native Tukals of the area. So we decided to experiment here in Uganda. We thought we would build one on the compound and see if we can outfit it for a family and learn how we could possible make something like this work in S Sudan. It has been an interesting process. I thought you guys might be interested in joining us in this journey. Here is how far we have come so far. We are mostly watching and learning from the Karimajong men who are building. 
First we measured how wide we anted the structure to be. then, we made a circle and the guys dug holes with long pieces of rebar and then put these support poles in the ground.

then, they made the supports level more or less


these reeds were brought from the bush, they will be used as the supports that wrap around the roof.

We went to the forest and cut down some trees. then the guys took the bark off the trees by beating it with a rock.

 some of those poles were then used to connect the supports

they connected the poles to the supports and one another using tree bark ropes. The ropes are soaked in water to make them more pliable then when they dry they shrink up and get tight.


the larger poles from the forest were used to make the roof's support poles.

then the reeds you saw earlier were bound to the roof poles with wet bark rope and some nails.

this is the bark rope being cut to the right width. It will then be soaked in water an used.

It is starting to come together.
Next step, putting grass on the roof

but we will save that for part two.

2 comments:

  1. amazing...every picture tells a story, don't it?

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  2. That is incredible! Thank you for sharing! I can't wait to see more!

    ReplyDelete