Building Together in an Egyptian Village
by Kate Bistline

The narrow canal fed by the Nile River had a festive look with alternating piles of red brick and white limestone along its length. We had arrived in El-Kom El-Akhdar, a village that has been completely transformed in the few short months since being accepted as a Habitat partnership community in Egypt.

Approximately 500 families live in this agricultural village south of the capital city of Cairo. By June, 80 families will have improved their lives by building a simple, healthy, affordable house through Habitat as part of the Jimmy Carter Work Project (JCWP) 2002. Thirty-nine Habitat houses were under construction in March and the excitement was building throughout the village.

El-Kom El-Akhdar was noisy with the sounds of laughter and construction. Families everywhere were tearing down crumbling mud-brick walls as they demolished one- and two-room, cave-like houses. Their grandfathers had built the houses—sometimes 80 to 100 years ago—using mud from the farms and dried plants and sticks for roofing. Over the years, insects and ground water invaded, making the houses uninhabitable. Extended families of more than seven members had grown desperate for living space.

Habitat homeowner Yousef Wanis pointed to the mud-brick and thatch house he was demolishing, "You can see this," he said. "How could we live here?" He took a vacation from work in order to speed up the building process.

Some of the narrow streets were blocked by piles of old mud and straw or by trucks waiting to haul old bricks away. It was a beautiful day for cleaning out the dirt — rare spring weather in what is usually a sweltering desert. Fathers chopped away at the old walls with hoes while mothers and children filled ofas (floppy baskets common in Egypt) and carried them out to the street. Dirt and dust covered everyone, but no one seemed to mind.

The theme of this year's JCWP is "Building Together Africa" and that's exactly what is happening in El-Kom El-Akhdar. There was a waiting list for the skilled builders, but no one was waiting for the builders to start. Neighbors who weren't working in their own home were next door sharing according to their abilities.

Habitat homeowner Fouly Abdel Azeem explained, "My neighbor is here helping because we have good relations with each other."

Some handed blocks to the builders so that the houses could be finished faster. Others perched on top of walls plastering and filling holes. Skilled workers laid alternating layers of red bricks and white limestone blocks to create beautiful patterns in the walls.

Because land is extremely scarce in Egypt (70 million live along the narrow Nile valley to avoid the inhospitable Sahara desert), families often share a wall with their neighbor. If both families had received a Habitat loan, they often work together to replace the common wall, reducing the cost of building for both.

Until the new walls and roofs are finished, families need somewhere to stay. In El-Kom El-Akhdar, most are blessed like Habitat homeowner Sayed Aziz El-Din, who smiled and pointed across the street. "We're staying with our neighbors," he said. Large families welcomed even larger families into their small homes because their neighbors needed a place to stay.

Even in the few houses not yet crowded with builders or neighbors, the families did not feel alone. Habitat homeowner Hakim Boutros explained that, today, he was being helped by God.

Since November, 73 JCWP houses have been completed in El-Kom El-Akhdar. Habitat homeowner Hakmia Hanna Abdel Sayed proudly displayed the Habitat sign on the wall in her new house. She always worried her old mud and thatch house would fall on her family, especially when it rained.

"Thanks be to God I sleep now very well and am not afraid."

—Kate Bistline is resource development and communications coordinator for HFH Egypt