June 06, 2008, cont. from front page, Adobe a cheaper option for construction, By Jesús Ibarra, Dengue prevention campaign for the state of Guanajuato, By Atención staff

More than 1,000 people who live in these communities, including Flores de Begoña, adjacent to Pantoja, derive their income from making bricks and do not know how to do anything else to survive, since they have worked making bricks all their lives.

The local Ecology Department is currently trying to promote the use of alternative fuels as well as to relocate the ladrilleras so they can continue operations.

A difficult, low-paying job

Don Benjamín Valdés, who owns a ladrillera, has worked making bricks for 38 years, since he was 10 years old. His father and grandfather also worked in the ladrilleras; they were born in Pantoja and have lived there all their lives.

Don Benjamín said that bricks are made from clay bought in Comonfort. The clay is mixed with sawdust and manure using water from Presa Allende. The mixture is then milled and molded. “The molding work is done by whole families: children, women, and even the elderly,” said Don Benjamín. “We pay them according to the number of bricks they make.” Doña María, who is 50 years old, has worked molding bricks since she was a little girl. “I am from Rancho Flores de Begoña, which is very close by,” she said. “I have 11 children. My husband and some of my children also work here. We work from 8am to 3pm and we earn about 300 pesos a day, depending on how many bricks we make. Even if we do not like the job, we have to do it, since it is all we know how to do,” said Doña María.

About 14 people work for Don Benjamín in his ladrillera. “Some of them are my relatives, my brother and my two sons, who are my partners, so we have to share the income. Others are employees.

Two complete families from Flores de Begoña are currently working for me. We pay them every Saturday; even if sales have been bad and we barely have money for their wages, we pay them without fail.”

Don Benjamín said that making and selling bricks is not a very good business, but “we have to work at this because we do not know how to do anything else. It used to be a good business 25 or 30 years ago, when there were not so many brick makers, but currently there are about 40 brick makers in Pantoja alone.” He said that there is a lot of competition among brick makers. “The one who sells cheaper is the one who sells,” he said. “Sometimes the quality does not matter so much. There are people who prefer to buy cheaper than to have quality. The quality depends on the amount of sawdust and manure, the amount of water and the length of time the bricks are fired.”

Don Benjamín said that more foreigners than Mexicans buy bricks. “San Miguel natives are generally poor people who do not have enough money and they buy their material for their houses little by little,” he said.

Don Benjamín and other brick makers in the area sell their bricks in the lot across from Plaza Real del Conde and pay the owner to rent space. “Sometimes I go to other parts of the city to sell, to the bus station or to Colonia San Luis Rey on Salida a Dolores. I move because I get discouraged waiting for a buyer,” said Don Benjamín.

A source of air pollution

After the bricks are molded, they must be dried five or six days before being fired. According to Don Benjamín, during the rainy season it can take up to 15 days to dry them. “The ovens are made of bricks cemented together with mud,” he said.

“For fuel we burn all kinds of plastic and rubber, such as bottles and tires. We know that this is a source of pollution, but that is the cheapest fuel we have available. The people from the Ecology Department came to check whether LP gas could be used to fire the ovens, but the bricks do not turn out well. They were unfired inside and burned outside.” LP gas, he remarked, is also quite expensive. He added that fuel oil is a good fuel for making bricks but that it is very expensive. Don Benjamín is currently using spent motor oil as a fuel for the brick oven, which according to him is less polluting than plastic because when it burns it produces white smoke, whereas plastic generates black smoke.

However, Julio Bernal, coordinator of the Air and Water Quality Office of the local Ecology Department, said that the only fuels allowed for firing bricks by the State Ecology Institute and by the state environmental protection office are natural gas, LP gas, fuel oil and diesel fuel. “Plastic generates carbon dioxide and toxic fumes. Although the approved fuels are more expensive than plastic, the brick makers will have to accept the regulations of the Ecology Department,” said Bernal, who added that inspectors from the environmental protection office have shut down some brick ovens several times, mainly in Nuevo Pantoja. “Brick makers are very aggressive. They have even threatened us with knives. I understand them because it is their way of life, but they have to obey the rules and use the approved fuels.”

As an answer to Don Benjamín’s comment that LP gas is not good for making bricks, Bernal said that in a ladrillera in Jalisco, called El Ranero, they are already using this fuel with good results. “We would invite the brick makers to tour this ladrillera so that they can see the results. There are a lot of technical factors that influence the quality of bricks, such as the shape of the oven. The Ecology Institute may support us with technical training and demonstrations of the different approved fuels so that the brick makers can continue working.”

Although not all of the 40 ovens in Pantoja burn at the same time, at least four or five do, generating a black cloud of smoke. Don Benjamín is worried about the families living among this pollution.

“I would like the Ecology Department to relocate the brickworks, but every time the local government promises they will do it, in the end they forget about it,” he said.

According to Bernal, there is a proposal that all the brick makers in the municipality be relocated to a parcel of land that would be called “Parque Industrial Ladrillero” (Brick Makers Industrial Park), located near Cruz del Palmar. Currently there are 42 brick ovens in Pantoja and Flores de Begoña, 8 in Nuevo Pantoja and another 50 spread throughout other communities in the municipality.

Casita Linda is a nonprofit Mexican organization founded in 2001; its primary goal is to provide simple, decent housing for the most disadvantaged who do not have proper homes.

The organization focuses on helping those whose resources are so limited that they cannot apply for government housing programs. An architect and artist from Querétaro, Pedro Urquiza, has recently brought some innovative ideas to the construction process.

Urquiza studied architecture at Anahuac University in Mexico City and then earned a master’s degree at Harvard University and another one in construction management at Georgia Tech. In 1980, he began offering a new option for construction: using adobe instead of concrete. He has built several adobe houses in San Miguel in neighborhoods such as Los Frailes, mainly for expat residents.

Urquiza spoke about his ideas and his contributions to Casita Linda.

Jesús Ibarra: How did you get involved with Casita Linda?

Pedro Urquiza: They invited me to give a conference with some architecture master’s degree students from Rhode Island School of Design, one of the most renowned schools for architecture in the US.

Their project was to modify or redesign Casita Linda’s construction scheme. I really did not know what Casita Linda was doing. When they explained the program’s goals to me and I talked with them, I thought they had great potential. I told them they should inject some new blood into Casita Linda and try to introduce people to the culture of building houses another way. I told them about my experience with constructing adobe houses and the reasons for using this material.

JI: And what are those reasons?

PU: Old houses in San Miguel or Querétaro, Morelia or any other Mexican colonial city are made of adobe, but usually people do not know this. Adobe is much cheaper than concrete. A house made of adobe does not need internal wall supports. I used to build large adobe houses, 4 or 4.5 meters high, and they would cost the same as a concrete house 2.5 meters high. Adobe also has better insulative properties. A house made of adobe would be cooler in summer and warmer in winter. A concrete house is generally warm in summer and cold in winter.

JI: Are people receptive to building adobe houses?

PU: No. Mexicans think that a house made of adobe would not be sturdy, but they have the wrong idea. Although adobe is constructed with mud, it is even sturdier than concrete. In South Yemen, in the time before Christ, they built a city in the middle of the desert with natural air conditioning. They built towers 11 or 12 floors high, very close to each other, of adobe. Because there are only small spaces between them, that area is shaded, and the desert wind cools as it passes between them. Adobe has been used in architecture for 3,000 years, in everything from the Roman circuses to cathedrals. Even architects and engineers in Mexico are not convinced about using adobe. At the university, we had several classes about structures and materials, and it is not easy to accept that there is a better material than those they taught us at school. On the other hand, Americans widely accept adobe houses.

JI: How did you get to know the benefits of adobe?

PU: I was born in an old hacienda in Querétaro, so I always knew old buildings were made of adobe. Once, I saw a photograph of an igloo. There was only the igloo with the blue sky behind it; all the rest was ice. I thought that if the Eskimos had not used the local material, ice, for their houses, they would have died. An igloo is made of ice blocks held together with more ice. It is the same with adobe: it is made of mud and cemented with mud, and it is available anywhere.

JI: Does adobe differ in quality from place to place?

PU: Yes. For example, the adobe from Querétaro is not of a very high quality. It has a lot of clay, which makes it susceptible to humidity. When this happens, we have to add organic matter, which can be straw or horse excrement, to the adobe. But the quality of the adobe does not greatly affect its utility. Some adobe houses in Querétaro are more than 750 years old and they have not fallen down. If the soil had a lesser amount of clay and more sand, the adobe would be of a better quality.

JI: How did the Rhode Island students take to your ideas about adobe?

PU: Very well. I first taught them how to build an adobe vault. The 16 students enthusiastically participated in the construction. The construction workers who assist me were astonished that a bunch of inexperienced students could build a vault.

When they finished building it, they all stood on top of it and it supported their weight. Then, they learned how to make a wall, and finally they decided they were ready to build an adobe house. They built it for Casita Linda, in the neighborhood of Ejido de Tirado. They spent a week excavating the foundation and two more weeks building the house. They understood perfectly that there was no need for internal supports, and they also understood that a vault can exert sideways force, so they built two opposing vaults. The house was for an 11-person family, so they built it with two floors. It is so easy to build an adobe house that a family can build it themselves, especially considering that many of the fathers are construction workers. Families in rural communities usually buy the material for their houses little by little, until they have all the bricks, cement and gravel and sand needed for the house. Building an adobe house would be cheaper for them.

According to Jean Gerber, a member of Casita Linda, the nonprofit organization intends to modify its construction scheme, including Urquiza’s ideas about the use of adobe. To contact Casita Linda, write to jean@casitalinda.org or go to www.casitalinda.org.

The Secretaría de Salud de Guanajuato (SSG) (The Ministry of Health), the Centro de Salud (Center for Health) and the state government are conducting a statewide campaign to help prevent dengue fever. In San Miguel de Allende the campaign is called Patio Limpio (clean yards).

According to the Ministry of Health of Guanajuato, last year 31 cases of dengue fever were reported in León. Guanajuato had not seen this illness before, and its outbreak seemed to be related to decreased fumigation efforts coupled with an increasing range of the carrier mosquito (Aedes aegypti).

With the aim of preventing reproduction of the dengue mosquito, the state government has initiated a prevention campaign to be held during May and June throughout the state.

Dengue is a viral disease that in some people can become severe and even cause death. Transmitted by a mosquito, it primarily affects children, the elderly and those with compromised immune systems. It takes two different forms: dengue fever and hemorrhagic dengue fever. The symptoms of dengue fever include high fever; headache; muscle, joint and eye pain; and vomiting. In addition to these symptoms, those with dengue hemorrhagic fever also suffer from bleeding of the gums and nose, skin rashes, upper or lower digestive tract bleeding, and bloody urine.

There are no vaccines or medicines to treat this disease, but doctors recommend keeping patients comfortable with medications for fever and body aches and giving them plenty of fluids.

According to Karina Anaya Moreno of the municipal epidemiology department, to help prevent mosquitoes from breeding residents should make sure there are no outside sources of standing water on their properties, including trays below potted plants or any other open receptacles.

Staff members from the Centro de Salud (Health Center) of San Miguel are currently going door-to-door delivering informative leaflets and insecticide.

Prevention

Mosquitoes bite in the morning and at dusk

Avoid prolonged periods outdoors

Wear light-colored clothing made of coarse cloth and long sleeves

Apply insect repellent containing DEET (N,N-diethyl-meta-toluamide or N,N-diethyl-3-metilbenzamida; not more than 35%)