Kenya house building projects
| country: | Kenya |
| departures: | Departures available 2-3 times a month on Saturdays throughout the year |
| price: | From £545 - £1645 (1-12 weeks) excluding flights. Price depends on length of stay. Includes accommodation, breakfast and dinner & 24 hour in-country support. Minimum age 18 |
| vouchers: | Gift vouchers can be used with this holiday |
the amazing things you'll be doing
Get your hands dirty building homes on projects in the stunning area of either Nakuru or Naro Moru. Get stuck into building one of the community development projects, help build houses for economic migrants or lend a hand creating a community church and dispensary near Mount Kenya. Whichever building venture you embark on, this is a fantastic opportunity not only to live and work alongside the community who will benefit from your efforts, but to also learn something of the difficulties facing those in the developing world. 
If you are building in one of the established community development projects in Nakuru, you may be laying or repairing the foundations for the community projects with children (orphanages), which will provide an educational centre, accommodation and medical care for the children and community who make their living on the local city dump. You may find that you are asked to work in the community of Hilton, directly beside the city dump, to build shelters for the people living there, usually single parents, or grandparents caring for their orphaned grandchildren.
In the Naro Moru area of Mount Kenya, the community is working to continue their social programmes of supporting people away from offending behaviour, offer additional support to single parents, and other much needed community support.
These are true community projects, where they fundraise, build, and make full use of a variety of buildings for many reasons. You will learn much about the social circumstances of many of the poorest people in rural Kenya. The current project is working with a local conservation group to help them build a future accommodation for volunteers to increase their opportunities for help and income. The projects depend on the goodwill and donations from the local community and sponsors. They welcome additional labour (don't worry - strong muscles aren't a must!), and any particular skills you may have, such as building, organisational, engineering, etc.
Your role as a volunteer:
You will get involved in many aspects of the building process, depending on the stage you join the project at. You could find yourself getting stuck into a number of tasks, ranging from helping to renovate established buildings, to finishing off work well under way, or starting a building completely from scratch!
You will need to have an appetite for hard work, be very hands-on, and willing to get involved with a variety of tasks. You should be an outdoors person and be prepared to work in different weather conditions. While building experience is not necessary, if you have a specific skill it will be welcomed! The ability to view the bigger picture and long-term goals on the project are essential to the understanding of activities that may seem repetitive and a little insignificant at times.
Very few community building projects have a set timescale for their construction, as local communities will raise some money, use it to buy materials and build until these materials run out. Then they will wait until they have raised more money to start on the next phase. For this reason, building projects in Kenya may change with quite short notice, so you must be prepared to fit in with whatever is currently going on.
You'll find there are many types of building processes in Kenya, ranging from traditional styles using locally found materials such as wood and stones, to the bricks-and-cement style you may be more familiar with, so you'll need to adapt to the materials you're working with.
Accommodation:
Whichever building project you volunteer on, you will be provided with local accommodation.
Nakuru - You will be living with a local family in a homestay. Nakuru is Kenya's fourth biggest town, about 160km from Nairobi, and is a fairly laid-back and modern town. Nakuru has a good transport system and is well linked to the rest of the country. Facilities are good, with several banks, internet cafes, tour operators, and hotels. Water and electricity may occasionally go off, but in general supply is reliable.
Naro Moru - You will be living at Batians view hotel, close to the community where you will be working. Naro Moru is a village in the foothills of Mount Kenya, Africa's second highest mountain. Water is freely available, with a boiler being used for heating it. There is electricity when the sun goes down, and there are plenty of power points to charge electrical gadgets. This is in a beautiful setting, where there are many birds, flora and animals to be seen! It's easy to arrange to climb Mount Kenya in four to five days, or just to take a day hike up part of this picturesque mountain.
the project
If you are building in one of the established community development projects in Nakuru, you may be laying or repairing the foundations for the community projects with children (orphanages), which will provide an educational centre, accommodation and medical care for the children and community who make their living on the local city dump. You may find that you are asked to work in the community of Hilton, directly beside the city dump, to build shelters for the people living there, usually single parents, or grandparents caring for their orphaned grandchildren. In the Naro Moru area of Mount Kenya, the community is working to continue their social programmes of supporting people away from offending behaviour, offer additional support to single parents, and other much needed community support.
These are true community projects, where they fundraise, build, and make full use of a variety of buildings for many reasons. You will learn much about the social circumstances of many of the poorest people in rural Kenya. The current project is working with a local conservation group to help them build a future accommodation for volunteers to increase their opportunities for help and income. The projects depend on the goodwill and donations from the local community and sponsors. They welcome additional labour (don't worry - strong muscles aren't a must!), and any particular skills you may have, such as building, organisational, engineering, etc.
Your role as a volunteer:
You will get involved in many aspects of the building process, depending on the stage you join the project at. You could find yourself getting stuck into a number of tasks, ranging from helping to renovate established buildings, to finishing off work well under way, or starting a building completely from scratch! You will need to have an appetite for hard work, be very hands-on, and willing to get involved with a variety of tasks. You should be an outdoors person and be prepared to work in different weather conditions. While building experience is not necessary, if you have a specific skill it will be welcomed! The ability to view the bigger picture and long-term goals on the project are essential to the understanding of activities that may seem repetitive and a little insignificant at times.
Very few community building projects have a set timescale for their construction, as local communities will raise some money, use it to buy materials and build until these materials run out. Then they will wait until they have raised more money to start on the next phase. For this reason, building projects in Kenya may change with quite short notice, so you must be prepared to fit in with whatever is currently going on. You'll find there are many types of building processes in Kenya, ranging from traditional styles using locally found materials such as wood and stones, to the bricks-and-cement style you may be more familiar with, so you'll need to adapt to the materials you're working with.
Accommodation:
Whichever building project you volunteer on, you will be provided with local accommodation.
Nakuru - You will be living with a local family in a homestay. Nakuru is Kenya's fourth biggest town, about 160km from Nairobi, and is a fairly laid-back and modern town. Nakuru has a good transport system and is well linked to the rest of the country. Facilities are good, with several banks, internet cafes, tour operators, and hotels. Water and electricity may occasionally go off, but in general supply is reliable.
Naro Moru - You will be living at Batians view hotel, close to the community where you will be working. Naro Moru is a village in the foothills of Mount Kenya, Africa's second highest mountain. Water is freely available, with a boiler being used for heating it. There is electricity when the sun goes down, and there are plenty of power points to charge electrical gadgets. This is in a beautiful setting, where there are many birds, flora and animals to be seen! It's easy to arrange to climb Mount Kenya in four to five days, or just to take a day hike up part of this picturesque mountain.
volunteer travel - what's it all about?
Are you looking for an adventurous trip with a purpose, or on a gap year or career break? If you want to make a difference in some of the world’s most important conservation areas - and in community projects - then volunteer trips are for you! Volunteers tend to have a sense of adventure, and come from a range of different backgrounds and from all over the world. Edward Abbey said 'sentiment without action is the ruin of the soul'.
how this holiday makes a difference
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We believe that travel can change lives! Travelling can change you as a person and, if done responsibly, can have a profound affect on the people that you meet and the places that you visit. We want as many people as possible to experience the heart and soul of another culture in the way that we have, and in doing so, help them to make a positive and lasting impact on our world.
Shelter is one of the basic human needs and it’s difficult to imagine a good quality of life that doesn’t include somewhere comfortable to lay your head. Providing good housing is one of the first steps in any meaningful attempt to tackle social problems so your efforts can make a real difference here. This project works in two distinct areas Nakuru and Mount Kenya If you are building in one of the established community development projects in Nakuru, you may be laying or repairing the foundations for the community projects with children (orphanages), which will provide an educational centre, accommodation and medical care for the children and community who make their living on the local city dump. You may find that you are asked to work in the community of Hilton, directly beside the city dump, to build shelters for the people living there, usually single parents, or grandparents caring for their orphaned grandchildren. In the Naro Moru area of Mount Kenya, a community is starting to build a church, where they can continue their social programmes of supporting people away from offending behaviour, offer additional support to single parents, and other much needed community support. Churches in Kenya are much more of a community resource than you may be used to in your own country; here they are truly community projects, where the congregation fundraises, builds, and makes full use of the building for many social improvement reasons. You will learn much about the social circumstances of many of the poorest people in rural Kenya. We do not own or operate any project but simply partner with them to assist in achieving their goals for development. It is this continuous stream of committed volunteers that allows the projects the time to focus on improving the lives of the people they work with. On this project you will be used to work on one of several projects; either (literally) laying the foundations for children’s homes and educational centres, building homes for people currently living on local rubbish dumps or helping a community build a church which will also act as a community centre. You’ll stay in a locally owned homestay (Nakuru) or hostel (Mount Kenya) ensuring that you directly support the local community while you’re there. You’ll also be supported by your local in-country coordinator; Pricilla who with her team are best placed to understand the specific economic, social and developmental needs of Kenya and the surrounding areas. On average 48% of your placement fee is distributed in-country for the services included with your placement (i.e. local support, food, transport & accommodation) meaning that the local communities are directly benefiting from your travels to their country. The remaining funds are required to cover the administration costs associated with sourcing, training, marketing and coordinating your travel experience. We do not give a financial contribution to this or any of our projects as we believe that money is rarely the answer to complicated development issues; if it was, the poverty problems in the world would be getting better! Short-term aid relief can cause aid-reliance and financial instability and the corruption seen in many developing countries means the guarantee of your money going to the heart of the cause is massively reduced. From our experience (and by learning from our mistakes) projects benefit far greater more from a sustainable framework to ensure they develop rather than short-term financial aid relief. If money is paid directly to projects then they may become dependent on that income. If that country or project becomes unpopular, or through restrictions in the opportunity to travel to that country, the money dries up and they are no longer able to continue with their work. Supplying projects with enthusiastic volunteers creates a constant supply of helpful hands and as they are not reliant on an income can continue without the assistance of the volunteer travellers, although significantly slower in achieving their goals. Instead of giving money direct we operate a grants scheme from our Helping Hand Foundation. This is designed to allow all our partner projects to submit applications for funding to achieve a specific objective. In 2007 we supported a number of partner projects including the installation of 20 toilets at a school in India, the construction of a community centre in Brazil and providing a radio communications unit for a turtle conservation project in Costa Rica. |
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