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Construction Training Program in Tagong: Results!

by Pamela Logan

March 9, 2006

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Today I arrived in Tagong and met with Khenpo Yonden, the abbot of Seng-ge Monastery.  We had a number of things to discuss, and one of them was the results of our construction vocational training program last year. I didn't really expect to get much news since the program was completed only in late November, and since then most Tibetans have been in hibernation due to the cold winter weather.

To my surprise, in answer to my query, Khenpo Yonden replied, "The training was very useful.  I'm building a house in Dorakarmo village now, and I hired some of the people who were trained."

He went on to say, "These days many people are building houses.  The government is encouraging nomads to settle down and providing a subsidy of 4,000 yuan to each family to build houses, so there's lots of construction work. People are asking me, 'do you know any good carpenters who can design my house and tell me how much wood is needed?'    If there hadn't been the training at Seng-ge Monastery, I would have had to go to Xinduqiao or Yajiang to find builders. Houses need to be earthquake-safe.  When people built houses by themselves before, the houses lasted only one or two years."

It seemed almost too good to be true, so I asked Khenpo Yonden if we could go see his house under construction and interview our trainees who were working on it.  He agreed, so Khenpo Yonden and I got into a USAID car with Kham Aid's own Wu Bangfu, who has worked very hard on this program, and Winrock's Kelsang Norbu and Pema Tsering, who have also supported it very well, especially in the later phases after Kham Aid ran out of money.  Together we drove the snow-covered dirt road the 10 kilometers or so to Dorakarmo Village.

 

 

The situation was indeed as Khenpo Yonden said.  The two foremen working on his home were stonemason Re-ong and carpenter Tupten, both our trainees who took the course last year.  (both had previous experience which is why they are good enough to be foremen).  I learned, however, that the other workers on Khenpo Yonden's house were not our trainees, but were new workers.  At first I was disappointed - were only two of the 40+ trained construction workers successful? 

Not at all!  We learned that other trainees were busy working on houses elsewhere; at least two additional work crews were formed besides the one led by Re-ong and Tupten.  And our stone-cutter trainees, whom I didn抰 see at the worksite, turned out to be at another location quarrying stone for the Khenpo's walls.

What's even better, the new-comers working with Re-ong and Tupten are learning new skills from them.  So, in less than six months, our program has already spawned a second generation of trainees.

They did say that the Dawu (Daofu) style of building, which includes added crossbeams for extra stability, is not being used. The first reason is: the trainees didn't get enough practice with it to be completely comfortable working on their own.  Carpenter Tupten explained, "If we try to build in the Dawu style, we'd need to ask questions of the teacher (who is not here), but building in this simplified style we can do it by ourselves." 

Second, the Dawu technique uses more wood and is therefore very expensive for most Tagong people.  Khenpo Yonden said, "In the Dawu style the structure is very safe and strong but in practice it's difficult because the cost is so high." (I told Khenpo Yonden that our goal is to make Tagong people rich so that they can easily afford nice houses in the future).

All around the worksite was evidence of the skills introduced by the training program teachers, Losang Dendrup, Shamba Gyatso, (both from Dawu) and He Zhanqun (from Kangding).  The stones in the walls of the house were nicely dressed with flat surfaces facing outward.  The dirt being used to make mortar was sieved to remove pebbles before being mixed. The corners of the house had been aligned with a plumb line, not by eye as had been formerly done.  And the carpenters were marking the saw-lines with an inked string tool introduced to them by Losang Dendrup.  

The most obvious indication of our program was the height and splendor of the new house.  At two stories, it was easily the tallest and best-built house in Dorakarmo village.  The other houses in the spread-out nomad settlement are only one story and built of stones piled on top of each other, not carefully cut and fitted together.

 

After one month of work for eight skilled workers and 15-20 unskilled laborers, there remained only five days to finish Khenpo Yonden's new house. Then the workers will easily find jobs working on other projects.

Stonemason Re-ong, who comes from nearby Pasang village where the existing skill level was already fairly high, said, "The training was very useful. I acquired a lot of new skills how to lay stones, and I'm using those skills now. I feel quite confident that I can do masonry by myself. "

The carpentry trade is perhaps more demanding than stonemasonry - or perhaps carpenter Tupten is just a bit more humble than his colleague. Tupten said, "I'd be interested to learn more by studying in Dawu. Apart from the cost, families here would like to have Dawu-style houses."

Although this was not a completely thorough program evaluation (we didn't interview all of the trainees and have no hard data on how many of them are earning a higher income as a result of our program), it is still encouraging anecdotal evidence that the training was successful.  I hope that we can continue training people in these and other construction-related skills.  I'm seeking more funds to continue training in stonemasonry and carpentry, including an apprenticeship component that will send the best workers to Dawu to study.

Chalk up a win for Kham Aid, our partner Winrock, and USAID who supplied the funding to make this program possible..