Rob Unger P.Eng. an employee of BC Hydro and Volunteer with BWB in Sri Lanka.

One of the most memorable experiences of my life occurred during this past year 2005. 

In 2001 I enrolled as a volunteer with Builders Without Borders (BWB), a Vancouver-based charitable organization that provides other international non-government charitable organizations with project management expertise to effectively undertake their construction activity abroad.

Above: Construction of the first floor walls begins on the apartment building Rob worked on in Sri Lanka.

The south Asian tsunami of December 26, 2004, devastated the coastal area of Sri Lanka south of the capital Columbo. BWB needed a construction engineer to assist in the construction of a 96-unit apartment complex for tsunami victims. They had partnered with Christian Children’s Fund of Canada (CCFC) who were to provide the funding and a local charity, Community Concern Society who would organize and manage the project. The assignment was to be for four months and I was to ensure financial controls were in place and that CCFC received value for their investment.

As a result of work commitments, I could only get away for two months. I would like to thank Bob Penney for covering for me and Tony Vanger (Tony retired last Friday after 32 years) and Aki Lintunen for allowing me to pursue this personal journey. I left at the end of the Labour Day weekend and made my first ever trip to Asia arriving in Columbo via Hong Kong and Singapore after about 30 hours of travel.

Below: Construction continues on the apartment complex. (Note the hard hats.)

I lived in an apartment about 15 kilometres south of Columbo with no TV, Internet, hot water or air conditioning but lots of mosquitoes. I was 150 metres from the Indian Ocean but the water was too dirty to swim. There was garbage everywhere and every time the wind blew it would fly around. Along the beach where the tsunami had struck was a slum of rickety-boarded shacks, no running water, power or sewer. The project office was next door and the site was some seven kilometres away.

I found out we were building on land that we had no property rights to. Who would own these units when they were completed, the government who owned the land or the charitable organization that had invested all the money to build them? And who would live in them, tsunami victims or "friends" of the government? My background in Properties was useful in focusing our efforts to resolve these fundamental problems.

The project had already commenced and we were about to pour the first foundations. Most of the workers were in bare feet (not much money left for proper footwear when you’re only making five dollars a day), and not a single hard hat. The contractor said his guys wouldn’t wear them as it messes their hair and it’s sissy. We instigated a set of safety regulations including mandatory hard hats and shoes. When making a final inspection, one of the workers pointed at his hard hat to remind me that I wasn’t wearing one.

I met some great people. I particularly remember Edwin, an elderly Tamil gentlemen who would help me with all my errands for tips. Edwin’s home (more like a shack) had been destroyed by the tsunami.

Below: Edwin, beside his new shack. Rob paid for the paint, a cost of about $2.

We became close friends and he preferred I treat him as my bodyguard and call him Rambo. We travelled together as it was cheaper for me to have him along and pay his way then travel alone and be vulnerable. I was his primary source of income and he cried when I left. As Mother Teresa said, "If you can’t feed a hundred people then feed just one".

Time went by quickly and soon it was time to return to Canada. The day I left, we poured our first elevated slab and the first three-storey building now has a roof on it. A couple of weeks ago, the CBC did a news piece returning to Sri Lanka a year after the tsunami to follow the life of a child who had been devastated by the tsunami. I was heartened when she was asked to choose her next home and she looked up at the same apartments that I had helped build and stated she wanted to live there. Small world.

Mother Teresa said, "Let us not be satisfied with just giving money. Money is not enough, money can be got, but they need your hearts to love them."

This was my experience and I would like to encourage others at Hydro to do the same. The rewards will last a lifetime. For those of you in Engineering and construction at Hydro, there are numerous opportunities with BWB.

I remember kissing the ground when I disembarked from the plane back in Canada. This journey really made me realize how fortunate we are here in Canada.

More information on BWB and the project in Sri Lanka that I was involved with can be found on the BWB website.