Our final wheelchair design. Photo: Juan Carlos Noguera Cardoza

BLOGGING FROM THE FIELD
July 29, 2011

After spending almost a month and a half in Guatemala, I feel that we’ve accomplished a great deal. Our wheelchair is finished and it is currently being used by Vinicio, one of the guys working in the shop. Besides being extremely light for a steel wheelchair (including the wheels, it weighs only 24lbs!), it has numerous additional features: a 2 degree-of-freedom backrest (which can slide both forwards on the frame as well as extending upwards), a horizontally movable axle, and also, an adjustable footrest.

This wheelchair, while it will probably not go into production, might give the Transitions Foundation some good ideas to implement in other wheelchairs – they can test each of the adjustable features on our wheelchair, and adapt them to the other chairs that they build.

In addition to our wheelchair, we also built an off-road extra wheel attachment, which clips onto the footrest of a wheelchair with a modified pick-up truck part. This attachment, now named the “Transitions U-Ride,” will be going into production, at least for many of the shop guys. After seeing Luis use his U-Ride every day, to and from work, many of the other wheelchair users have expressed their interest in having one for themselves.

Now that I’m back home, I realize just how much this trip has changed my outlook on the world. I’ve had the opportunity of immersion in another culture, while at the same time working with some of the funniest and most creative people I have ever met. Although many of the guys in the shop are paralyzed and wheelchair-bound, they don’t let it hamper their activities in any way. In fact, they are happier and enjoy life much more than most people, disabled or not. Their positive attitude and the closeness of their community – I’d even go as far as to call it a family – is something to be admired.

This experience has also taught me that engineering can have a great impact on peoples’ lives. And it’s not always the most technical or advanced designs that are successful – sometimes having an easy and simple way, for example, for someone to get into and out of their wheelchair can have drastic effect on the quality of their life.

I’d like to sincerely thank the MIT Public Service Center and their donors for providing me this amazing opportunity, and for caring about making a difference.

Read the rest of Paul's blog posts at http://mitpsc.mit.edu/blog/?page_id=666

Shirley writes about her trip to Tanzania:

“I miss Tanzania a lot, and especially everyone that I had met. People are so nice to everyone there. They are now great friends of mine, and thanks to the internet, I am able to keep in touch with them! I also started a Hi5 (a social networking website) profile, so that I can keep my network going.
…
A lot of my friends are asking questions like ‘What was the most memorable thing from the trip?’ Or similar questions like the sort, I can’t seem to answer those questions. Every little thing was memorable, everything was really eye opening… And things just can’t be described in words.”

Maybe some of these things can be described in pictures! Shirley has posted her photos from the trip at http://picasaweb.google.com/shirley.mit07.


Here is an elephant that Shirley saw on safari.

You can keep reading Shirley’s blog throughout the year, to learn which MIT classes she will be taking and her plans after graduation, and to see the occasional “cute kitten” video.

Jessica and Cat ended their fellowship in India with a vacation in Goa, a coastal Indian state that is one of its most enticing beach destinations. The photos below were taken at Palolem Beach on India’s Independence Day, August 15th.

Cat wrote in her latest blog entry:

“Today I did yoga on the beach in the morning, had mixed fruit, yogurt and tea for breakfast, rented a scooter and drove to two nearby beach villages (don't worry mom, we only had one small, mini-accident, even though I have never driven a scooter before and didn't even know which knob was the accellerator).
…
Then we went to the beach and I swam to an island against the current which took a really long time and I was very tired and when I got to the island it was surrounded by shallow, poity and slimy rocks and I just hung on to the closest one for a while until I could come up with the best plan for getting back to the beach.
...
I will miss you very much India. Thank you for an amazing summer.”

Cat and Jessica in Goa.

Tish also described her final day in Africa:

“… for now I'm packing up my things, cleaning my apartment, saying some last goodbyes, and heading to the airport to pick up my family. Hopefully they recognize me, big hair and all!

This has been the most amazing summer. Thank you to everyone who made it possible!”

At lunch with a family she met in Tanzania.

Tish promises to post the hilights of her trip on her weblog, so keep checking back at http://tishinafrica.blogspot.com/.

Biyeun has returned to the States after a successful fellowship project at InterConnection Uganda. Before leaving, she answered the following question in an interview:

So why do you keep coming back to Uganda?

"This year is my third visit back, but I was so caught up in the technical work behind setting up InterConnection Uganda that I forgot for a bit why I was here. I had one train of thought: get this place up and running. But that was it…and I sometimes felt a little empty, like I was missing something. And I was.

I didn’t do the CFU lab installations this year. I was missing the Ugandan students...

…
So I guess you can say I come back for that…to bring fuel for creativity. Because every wide-eyed student I meet can change this country. I want to see them contribute to the economy by creating new, innovative businesses. I want to see them investigate the problems in their communities on their own and actually have resources to find solutions. I want to teach them to teach themselves, and I think there is no better and cheaper tool for that in this environment than a computer and access to the Internet.”

Thank you for reading the Public Service Center’s fellowships weblog.

http://web.mit.edu/mitpsc/fellowships/

“I realized that my photojournalism could go beyond advertising for [my own cause], but could also serve to celebrate the students' achievements, teach the MIT community about the problems in other countries, and motivate others to get up and volunteer themselves.”

Christina raised funding for her project with much hard work and dedication. In her blog, “Through My Eyes," she has posted her photos and thoughts while visiting the following countries:

1. New Delhi, India
2. Nairobi, Kenya
3. Kampala, Uganda
4. Arusha, Tanzania

Here below is a sample of the beautiful photos on her website.

“There are several large cultural differences which I find hard to accept, the main one being the aggressiveness and forwardness of the people. There are no lines or right of way, it’s whoever makes it to the front first, and whoever can be the most forceful to get their way first.”

“I love the different flavored fantas and they drink tea in the same way as Indians with boiled milk instead of water and tons of sugar. It is quite a treat…”

“Hell’s Gate: Tales of Beauty, Adventure, and Sickness.”

“Empowering the Disabled from Childhood”

Do you recognize this photo from last week? It is Uganda’s vice president playing the drums.

“The ruralness of Uganda surprised me as I’ve heard it being called the 'pearl of Africa.' Driving into Kampala, the largest city of Uganda, it was like driving into the old downtown of Nashua, New Hampshire near where I attended high school… little to no tall buildings, no jam packed sidewalks or roads, plenty of space between buildings, and relatively clean air minus the dust and the random spouts of exhaust that clouds around me if a matatu (a mini bus that I believe I described in a Kenya entry) drives by me.”

“Staying with a host family, I really became integrated into their lifestyles and got to know them on a whole new level. When you live with people, a different connection forms, even in dorm life, however imagine living in the same one-level house….”

Now that you’ve seen some of her photos, you can read more about Christina's experiences at http://csk07.blogspot.com.

Come back next week for the final updates from Biyuen, Shirley, Tish, Jessica, and Cat! To find out more about Public Service Center fellowships, check out this link.

Cat reports on some of the last days of her trip with a must-read post: The best day of my trip to India.

She writes, “At 7:30pm last night we presented our parting gift to the community: a slide show / movie of the community members over the past three weeks, so that the community could see through our eyes the love and unity possible in the community. The pictures were often of children, or older community members with children and it was magical...the whole market area in front of the temple filled up with over 200 community members and families perched on balconies and roofs to get a good view.”

Some of the 200+ community members that attended Cat's slide show / movie

Jessica, also, working with Cat, describes some of the outcome of their project :

“So you must be wondering...what are the benefits of a sanitation project aimed at reducing trash in the waterways and ground?

1. less bugs/mosquitos which breed in the stagnant trash clogged waters

2. less disease spread

3. less water cloggage

4. a nicer/clean community to live in

5. community unity around a single cause”

A fellow MIT student, Julie, models one of the trash bins that will be used in the community.

Jessica wrote, “This week has been action-packed everyday, challenging, and exhausting for our whole team as we are all determined to make our ambitious sanitation project successful, sustainable, and tailored to incorporate community input at every step.”

Jessica and Cat had an unforgettable, enriching, and productive summer in Dehli. Check back next week for more photos and updates!

Across the globe in Tanzania, Tish continues to write about her adventures in her weblog “Tish Takes Tanzania.” The entry, “Let me catch you up,” lists her top 10 memories from recent weeks. The first is this one:

“Visited Emmanuel, a 12 year old boy who was housebound since birth because of a disability, but is now able to attend school because of a wheelchair provided by Mobility Care. When we asked him what he wanted more than anything he said “education.” Unfortunately, while the wheelchair allows him to attend school now, some of the other children are not very nice to him. We are looking into finding him a sponsor so he can attend a school in Dar es Salaam which is only for disabled children. It’s the same school where Daniel received his education and he turned out pretty amazing!”

This is not Emmanuel, but is one of the other test users for the wheelchair, Peter (left).

If you read more at Tish’s weblog, you will also learn about: a wheelchair attaining 15km/hr speeds going into town, a small earthquake, and Tish’s Kenyan neighbor discussing the TV show “Desperate Housewives.”

Tish also visited fellow blogger Shirley Fung at the wheelchair training camp in nearby Moshi, Tanzania, where Shirley is working. Shirley describes both her successes and struggles in brining wheelchair technology to the community in this post:

"This morning, I met a student working at KCMC from the States, Salman. He is a student from Duke, and is here with other students to fix up broken medical equipment. He brought 5 broken wheelchairs that he found in a closet somewhere, and brought it to the wheelchair workshop to be fixed. He says he works with a program called Engineering World Health through Duke. The staff here at the workshop then spent all morning and fixed up all 5 wheelchairs. Now they can be used again to help transport patients around the hospital!

"...So I wanted figure out if there was a way to … get the sponsors for these wheelchairs to invest in these locally made wheelchairs instead. What we found out about these [non-local] wheelchairs is that Wheelchair Foundation actually earns a large profit by cutting costs and receiving a good amount of money from donors to get these wheelchairs distributed. It seems like there is a substantial amount of money involved, and I am not so sure how I can go about improving this situation."

Shirley has also posted photos! Check back here next week for more, or click on the link http://picasaweb.google.com/shirley.mit07

The airport near Moshi

Shirley and Tish in Moshi village

Finally, in Uganda, blogger Biyeun is having success developing the InterConnection Uganda computer refurbishing center. As seems to be the case almost every week, Biyeun has met with yet another Ugandan politician to celebrate the development of the center. This time it is lunch with the First Lady:

Biyeun writes, "'Mamma Janet' is the name Ugandans have given to the First Lady, Janet Museveni, because she acts just like a mother for her country. She is a very powerful figure, but perhaps one of the most humble and caring people I’ve met."

Here below is a picture of a party at the Vice President’s house in Entebbe. The Vice President is on the drums!

Read more of this post here!

And check back next week, when we will present some photos taken by Christina Kang, a PSC fellow whose fellowship entailed traveling to visit the other PSC fellows and documenting their work with photos. Brought to you by the Public Service Center fellowships program.

The Ugandan Minister of Education cuts the ribbon

In his speech at the opening, the Ugandan Minister of Education praised the collaboration between MIT and Ugandan IT students:

"…starting from simple secretarial services for small businesses to communicating commodity prices to local farmers, assisting NGOs to achieve their goals, or helping address critical health care and other governmental challenges facing Uganda… This is no simple task and will require creativity and collaboration. It is here that we want to contribute by bringing United States college students like Biyeun, who attends the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, to work with her fellow Information Technology students here in Uganda.”

Biyeun herself has also been quickly moving forward… on a motorcycle!

“In other news…I rode my first boda-boda today! Boda-bodas are these motorcycles that you see all over Uganda weaving in between the cars, going through the ditches, and generally causing all sorts havoc in the traffic (they are not as bad as matatus though).”

A boda-boda in Uganda.

In India, Cat and Jessica are moving forward on their project to contribute to sanitation efforts New Delhi’s slums.

Jessica says, “So this week we begin the second phase of our project in which we will use everything we learned studying the slums near Deepalaya and apply our strategies to a new slum area nearby. Though only a few kms away, this slum in Govindpuri Kalkaji is definetly worse than the others we have seen. It's bisected by a busy road and has many shops and vendors, meaning more trash and littering. … We met up with a local NGO, the YWCA (like the YMCA in the U.S. but targeted towards women). They provide vocational training for older women and academic schooling for younger children.”

The New Delhi YWCA.

Blogger Cat also went to the YWCA, and the women were invited to their supervisor’s house in Faridabad, a town outside of Delhi. The photo above was taken there.

Cat continued her community survey to find out about education conditions for poor and disabled children.

She says about an NGO-run school, “This school looked amazing - certainly better looking (on the inside) than my elementary school.” The photos is below.

The school

She continued, “In the nearby community...these two guys aren't old enough to school but they give their mother and grandmother good company at home during the day. NOTE: it seems to be an Indian tradition that when children learn to walk they get squeeky shoes so you can always tell when little kids running around because they go: ‘squeek, squeek,squeek,squeek,...’”

Two boys who Cat met

Jessica also spent one day on what she called “Western Luxury.”

“Later that night we ventured into Faridabad, neighboring region to Delhi and found a movie theater! A 25 minute rickshaw ride only costs us about $0.15, since Faridabad's autorickshaws operate like minibuses. We were able to get tickets to the new Harry Potter movie (not in Hindi! and only about $3.00) and since I'm one of the biggest Harry Potter fans ever I was beaming through the entire movie, which I loved! Personally, I had imagined the Department of Mysteries to be a bit different but I thought Bellatrix Lestrange was perfectly cast.”

Read more of Jessica’s entries http://jlee629.blogspot.com/, and Cat’s at http://catinworld.blogspot.com/.

In Tanzania, Tish has been making a foldable tray for the wheelchairs she is designing. In an entry called “Work work work,” she says,

“What a busy week! At Mobility Care we have hard at work prototyping our first design for the foldable tray, which is coming along pretty nicely. The only problem is that everybody is so excited to work on it, that I feel bad reminding them that they should be sure to take care of their own business first before helping me with mine. It seemed like an easy task at first—just cut a rectangular piece of wood and have it fold out onto the user’s lap. But alas it’s much more complicated than that. The user needs to maintain full functionality while in the chair—so basically this means that when folded, the tray cannot hinder the user in any way.”

In this photo, she tests a wheelchair’s stability (not one of the wheelchairs with a foldable tray, it seems!) and “has a little fun,” in her words.

Tish has also been to the market and to the sea! Above, at a mango stand in Zanzibar, and below, on a scuba dive boat off the coast.

Read more about Tish's adventures here: http://tishinafrica.blogspot.com/

“We’ll be visiting Lake Manyara and the Ngorongoro Crater. It’ll be a camping safari, so we’ll be spending a night in the tent.According to the Lonely Planet guidebook, here are some features of the two parks we are going to visit: