Study Abroad Peru 2013: May 1: Day 5, Part 1 (Cusco)

Propane stove in Mattinga.

Today started out pretty early (if you haven't sensed my hatred of mornings...you aren't paying attention) as we were trying to get up to Mattinga in time for lunch at 10am. We recorded lunch at the house of the President of Mattinga and the house of another woman named Ide.

We learned many interesting things from her. Ide had a traditional cookstove, a rocket stove, and  propane stove. **TECHNICAL NOTE: A "rocket stove" can mean slightly different things to different people, in this case I just mean a stove with an extra hole to provide more air access to the fire and hopefully increase combustion. This is different from traditional Peruvian stoves which only have a small opening on the front for fuel and oxygen.**

Potatoes and Cheese...Lunch anyone?

Ide told us that she early only used the propane stove in emergencies because the propane is very expensive and difficult to bring up to Mattinga (they have to carry everything on their backs and all the way from Cusco, which takes us more than an hour by vehicle). She also told us that she sometimes uses the rocket stove but the problem is that she can't fit all of her pots (this rocket stove featured holes to insert pot and allow the bottom to be closer to the heat while maintaining a large combustion chamber), particularly the big ones she uses for family gatherings. She also doesn't like to use the small pots because too much of the smoke comes up at her face. Plus one of the NGOs that came in taught her how to build a chimney for her traditional stove which keeps all of the smoke out of her house anyways, one of the benefits of the rocket stove they built and a feature many Peruvians do not have.

Apparently Kristen's toes are tasty to
giant dinner...I mean...bunnies.

This was all very interesting because we had no idea that the government had come and built rocket stoves for all (most of) the people. According to Ide most of the people did not use them at all. Instead they had ripped them out for space, or modified them to look more like their traditional stoves. Those who did still have them only used them occasionally because they were very inconvenient (different).

This illustrates one of the reasons that GEO tries so hard to talk to the people as we are building our projects. We don't want to bring an idea to people who don't like it and/or won't use it. We aim to improve people's lives not only through designing products they will like and use but also through teaching the people as much of the principles and how to make the product as possible. This way they have the opportunity to learn to apply the principles in other areas, as well as make and maintain the product themselves. The more people can learn to pull themselves up, the better off they are.

Come back Thursday for the exciting conclusion!