Project Proposals

Barrier Wall Project for Yatong Village Project Manager: Tashi Hlamo (Charlene) Build a barrier wall for the 200 people of Yatong Village, blocking the floodwaters from the river, and protecting the village and monastery. People will be safe and the floods will not destroy their homes and belongings. Funds needed: $6,794   (43,136 rmb)

Tashi Hlamo (Charlene)
Tashi Hlamo is from Waluo village, Jialaxi Township, Narong County, Ganzi Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan Province, China. She is currently working towards an Associate's degree in English at the Qinghai Normal University Nationalities Department English Training Program. She has been learning English since September of 2003.

Project Location:
The project is located in Aga monastery in Yatong village. Yatong village is in Jialaxi Township, Narong County, Ganzi Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan Province. Yatong village is 13 km from Narong County town.

Project Background:
Aga monastery is in Yatong village in the south of Jialaxi Township, near Jialaxi River. Aga monastery, though small in size with 107 monks, has a deep and long history. Built more than three hundred years ago, it houses many ancient artifacts. There are seventeen households surrounding the monastery. These 17 households together make up Yatong village. Aga monastery is the most ancient monastery in Narong County.

Yatong is actually classified as neither an agricultural village nor a nomadic village. Therefore, most households own no land and have no livestock. The village has 4 single men and 2 healer-oracles. In addition, there are 8 households, which were moved near the monastery from nomadic areas. In 1998, there was a heavy snow lasting seven days. Thus, most of these households' livestock died from starvation. There are also three young couples who, since they married without parental support, had no place to go and so came to Yatong to eek out a living in poor conditions in small, ramshackle houses.

Population:
There are approximately 70 people in the village. There are 31 men, 25 women and 14 children. In addition, in the monastery, there are 107 full monks and 21 young monk-acolytes. The monks are from different villages in Jialaxi Township. The youngest monk is 12 years old and the oldest monk is 76 years old. The majority of the monks are 30-45 years old.

Education:
In terms of monastery residents, there are 107 monks in the monastery. Almost all of these monks have no formal schooling. Only 18 of the 107 monks attended school before they entered the monastery. 89 of the monks have never received any non-monastic education. .

As for the non-monastic Yatong village residents, there are 9 school-aged children, but none of them are going to school because their parents cannot afford their tuition fees and the nearest school is 5 kilometers away. It would be very hard for them to go to school and return home on foot every day.

Cash Income:
Most of the monks in the monastery make barely enough money to support themselves. The cost of clothes, medicine, and electricity per person per year is about 650 RMB. Fortunately, they do not need to pay for fuel or water. They fetch water from Jialaxi River, near the monastery. The average monk is able to make about 650 RMB per year.

The monks of Aga earn their living in three ways. First, they earn up to 60 RMB by begging every month in the surrounding villages. Second, when there is an opportunity, they can earn about 10 RMB and 1 kilogram of noodles per day for chanting in people's houses. Third, monks who are over 50 years of age must depend on their families.

The government provides tea leaves and salt to 6 unmarried villagers who are without children. The government gives each healer-oracle or single person 350 RMB per year for their tealeaves and salt. However, this is not enough for their annual needs. Fortunately, the leader of the monastery helps them beg for tsamba, butter and flour from surrounding villages in Jialaxi Township. The leader of the monastery gives each healer –oracle or single person about 30kg of tsamba, 10kg of flour and 2kg of cheese every month. The Villagers go out and work to earn money. Men and women both go to construction sites to carry baskets of earth on their backs. Through this work, each woman can earn 20 RMB per day and each man can earn 25 RMB per day. Some women rent other people's fields so as to be able to plant crops, giving back half the barley they grow to the property owners as rent. The average cash income is approximately 1,400 RMB per person per year, which the villagers use to maintain their houses and to buy clothes, food and other supplies. This amount is not enough since each family actually needs about 3,500 RMB for adequate necessities every year . Since they have no land and no livestock, their lives depend only on this meager cash income.

Agriculture:
The monks themselves don't have any fields. Their families are in one of the several villages of Jialaxi Township. These families support the monks by giving food, clothes and building houses for them. A rich family has about 8 mu of land with which they can earn 3,000 RMB per year. And a poor family has about 3 to 4 mu with which they can earn about 1,000 RMB per year.

Herding:
Some of the villagers raise livestock. The families located nearby the monastery each own, on average, 4 cows, 1 bull and 2 female yaks. From the cows and female yaks they have enough butter and cheese for themselves, but they have no extra butter or cheese to sell. Monk's families similarly have about seven animals per family on average, while the monks themselves have no livestock at all.

Weather:
Four seasons a year is normal, but summer and autumn come with almost daily rainfall in Yatong village. Thus, in summer and autumn, Jialaxi River floods over every year. The flooding is a disaster for the monastery and village. Floodwaters rush through the residents' houses, causing damage and destruction. In fact, a healer-oracle named Dengzi Dorlma drowned in the flooding of 2002. In the winter, the weather is very cold but the villagers are able to obtain wood to make fire.

Project Goals and Benefits

The overall goal of the project is to improve the safety and living standards of the villagers and monks. The immediate goal of this project is to build a barrier wall, 350m long, 1.5m high, 0.8m wide and 0.5m on top, in order to prevent flooding.

Problems:
Flooding
Every summer, Jialaxi River rises and it turns a brownish color.

The flood damages all the monks' belongings, including some scriptures, books, clothing, statues, and even their houses. Flood waters damages villagers' clothing, food and other belongings. The floodwaters can also take lives. For example, as mentioned above, on the night of July 4 th 2002 the flood took the life of Dengzi Dorlma and destroyed her house. The floodwaters rise one second and recede the next. Therefore, the villagers are unable to determine how to protect themselves from flooding before the floodwaters arrive. Sometimes the water level swells at daytime, and sometimes it swells at nighttime when people are sleeping.

High Stress
Because of the frequency of flooding all the villagers and the monks tend to worry a lot and are unable to sleep at night in summer. Especially on rainy days they know that the flood might come. So some people don't sleep all night long to watch the flood and to prepare to run away. Also as the flood has destroyed the villagers' families and destroyed or damaged all their property, their lives are extremely difficult. So the residents of this area are under a lot of stress.

Economic problems
P arents in Yatong village have no money to send their children to school, as the flood periodically destroys all their things. Thus, both parents and children have to go out and look for jobs to earn the money to survive. Though the parents get some money from work they have to use it to reconstruct flood-damaged houses and basic necessities. Therefore at this time the village's parents have put the education of their children out of their minds as an impossible goal. In addition, it is difficult for them to get enough food as they have nothing left after the floods. Each family has been spending more than 2000 RMB per year rebuilding their houses.

Health
Because of every year the flood comes and the villagers are not able to completely rebuild their houses, in winter they live in extremely poor conditions. So often the villagers are very cold and the children are likely to get serious illnesses. However, when this happens, of course, they have no money to buy medicine and see doctors.

Benefits:

1. If a barrier wall is built, 200 people will benefit from the project. Because the dam can block floodwaters from the river, it can protect the village and the monastery from the floods. Therefore the people will be safe and the floods will not destroy their houses and belongings. Their conditions will improve and they needn't spend their money rebuilding their houses each year. In addition, with a barrier wall, people will no longer die from the flood.
2. As p arents will not need to spend their money rebuilding their houses, they will be able to use that money to send their children to school. Therefore the village's children will be able to attend school and will have the chance to improve their future opportunities.
3. The money the villagers will save from not needing to rebuild their houses, about 2000 RMB per year, can also be used to buy daily necessities such as food and clothes.
4. With houses that are not continuously damaged and in need of repairs or rebuilding, the village children will be less likely to get cold and sick. In addition, money saved due to the building of a barrier wall can be spent on medicine.

Beneficiaries
200 people will directly benefit from this project

Gender equality:
I am the first woman from my hometown taking charge of an endeavor of import to the village. People have been surprised that I am taking on this endeavor, especially the men in my hometown. Since women have a low position in the culture of my home area, most people believe women are unable to do such things. So, if this project is successful, there will be the added advantage that the villagers will get rid of their idea that women are only good for housework. Also, the female members of my hometown will be encouraged by my example.

Governmental support:
On March 9th 2006, Tsering (the leader of the monastery) and Chos las Rgyl `tsho (the second leader of the monastery) met with Songga Lima, our county leader, to discuss this project. Songga Lima decided to give us the permission to do the project.

Sustainability:
This project is very sustainable, because all the villagers and monks will benefit from this project for the long-term. T he monks and the villagers will be responsible for the sustainability of this project. They will pay for maintenance of the barrier wall after the project is completed. In addition, the leader of the monastery Kanqian Tsering already contacted Boss Li who is from Narong county town. Boss Li is a good constructor and he has a lot of experience with architecture. He was responsible for the completion of Dengguang Square in our county town in August 2006. Boss Li promised Tsering to bring his skilled workers to Aga monastery (Yatong village) to establish a firm dam. We will sign a contract with them so that after the dam is completed, we managers will oversee it and if we think it is not well built, we can ask them rebuild it at no extra cost. They live in our county town and will be required to do as we ask.

The steps of the project:

1. Hold a meeting to discuss urgent needs and gather information for project proposal (already completed)
2. Meet with Kan Qian Tsering who is the leader of the monastery to discuss detailed plans for a dam. (Already completed)
3. Meet with the villagers and the monks and let them choose three work committee leaders (already completed):

• One is the leader of the monastery, Qian Tsering.
• One is the second leader of the monastery Chos las Rgyl `tsho
• One is a woman who has more education and experience than other women in the village, Erji Hlamo.

1. Write project proposal. (Already completed)
2. Have a meeting with the three leaders of the project Tsering, Chos las Rgyl` tso and Erji Hlamo. Together, we will arrange the time and hire some other villagers' tractors in order to carry the stones, sand and cement.
3. Hire 2 experienced tractor drivers who are from another village to carry stones, cement and sand. The cement and sand will be purchased from Narong county town. It is 13km from the village. The stone will be purchased near the village.
4. Hire skilled workers in our Narong county town to start construction work.
5. Supervise the process of the project.
6. Complete the project.
7. Interview local children, men and women and monks for a final report.
8. Take pictures for a final report.
9. Write the final report.
10. Send the final report with all pictures and receipts.

imeframe:
Time line: From the time that the proposal is approved, this project will take approximately 36 days.
1 day: Hold a village meeting.
8 days: Transport stones from nearby village.
5 days: Purchase sand and cement to transport from county town.
1 day: Purchase small materials and transport from our county town.
20 days: Build the barrier wall.
1 day: Hold a second village meeting to clarify responsibilities of dam committee and announce completion of project.

Detailed Budget

Local Contribution

Photos

Villagers to rebuild their houses and prevent floodwaters from reaching their homes use the logs in the picture.

Jialaxi River and the households located beside the river.

A neighboring village


This is a healer-oracle's home, close to the river. She is named Tsechen Zhouma