The Pyramid Project
The Pyramid Project |
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Daily News - November 2007
30 November 2007 Another Day... Another day building the raft building building!
29 November 2007 Investment Received $100,000 was received by the project today. This is great news because according to the cash flow it means that if the project stays on budget and with money from the Shamanic Tour then we will have enough money to make it through to November 2008. Currently from this month until January 2009 we dip into the red by around $50,000. However, with some good donations we will make it through this period Walter's team doing well Today Matthew swung by Walter's workshop so we could get some pictures of the new drill
I tested the new template they made. After docking the holes on to the bench above I rotated the template around 180 degrees to see if the holes would still align true. They were all spot on, thanks guys! It takes around 20 minutes to drill one hole because the motor heats up quickly. Each hole is also actually 3 holes of increasing diameter - this aids precision as well as spreading the work of the motor Building a raft building building Lots of building today. The Ayahuasca kept me up all night and showed me how to create a raft building station where the raft is made above the water and then dropped down when complete. Finally after 10 hours under the sun we got to where I wanted to be but there are still major design issues because of the large weight of the Topa, especially when wet. We still haven't built a single raft but I know that we will and when we do we will set up a production line of raft building. Lots of guys hanging around wanting jobs and unless I have that first raft built with a tight building procedure then I cannot let them loose
Remocaspi starts to arrives Again Hector's team doing a great job and this time delivering Remocaspi. Two pieces of 11m and one thicker piece of 7m arrived. Remocaspi is a lovely twisty wood and are to be used in the central structure from the swimming pool right up to the top of the spiral staircase to the pyramid's apex
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November 2007
Raft Building Begins Today we began to build our first raft but then hit a load of problems
First of all the drill is not long enough to go through all the Topas, we tried to find another longer one but there aren't any longer than 20cm. Second the guys tying the Topa wanted to use too many meters of rope, also their way is totally random. I want a regular rope pattern where I can measure how much rope is being used and also know that the design is strong enough
I don't know that pattern or how to overcome the problems so I decided tonight that I will ask the Ayahuasca Hector has said that he wants to deliver the rest of his Topa contract early, like on Saturday! Here is the scene at the moment...
Well, we'll find a solution of course. Today was a tough day Good news now. Walter's team have got themselves "precisioned" up with their new drill. Matthew and I will swing by there tomorrow and take a few shots. The drill is a big thing for them to have in their workshop and the guys there are very motivated
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November 2007
Health Workers Striking Doctors and nurses were on the streets protesting because of low pay
Topa Work Today 10 men helped on site. 6 helped moving Topa out of the water to dry. One guy was on the job of tarring and 3 men were turning Topa ready for tarring the other ends. Now we have around 80 which are tarred both ends and tomorrow we will start building rafts!
Here we are fixing the design on a model ready for tomorrow...
Iron joints Also today the Pyramid purchased a workbench drill for Walter's team for over $200. They were having problems getting the precision required because all of their drilled holes had to go out to a third party. Now with a drill in their workshop they are confident they can meet the tight specification required. They are making a steel template that has 10 holes in a row at equal distances, if the template is rotated 180 degrees it should remain true. Like I said to the guys, it's easier to get it right in the workshop then to have to correct a problem 16 metres up a ladder. Just to prove the point I suggested that they might like to do the building of the iron structure also
Go Charlie! Charlie, our document translator, came up trumps delivering all the pyramid's missions translated into Spanish. So now to get it added to the Internet. Nice job Charlie
Katie and Claudia... Katie our future trance dance, art therapist and presenter confirmed her interest in coming to Peru to work on the pyramid. Katie and I met in Egypt where we followed the moon all through the night, sometimes walking, sometimes skipping and once even in a horse and carriage. Eventually we arrived at the Great Pyramid and whispered a prayer to the moon because when we left Cairo to get to Giza we didn't actually know which way to go, Katie just said lets follow the moon...
Claudia and her boyfriend are also gearing up for the move here next year. Claudia will be running the restaurant and doing some nutritional presentation. She is really looking forward to this venture altho I think she is a little nervous. Well remember what Betty Spender said Claudia, "The things that initially scared me the most were the things that were most worth doing" The restaurant will serve extremely healthy food catering for Vegan and raw foodists. I guess we'll include some fish in there, perhaps the vegetarian fish (ones with no teeth), well we'll see what Claudia cooks up! I met Claudia when she came out exploring reality in Iquitos. It was March 31st this year and a lovely day when a small party of us crossed the river in a boat looking for a suitable place to site a pyramid
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November 2007
Just when we thought it was safe to take a breather with some more tarring, up pops Hector with another 400 Topas! Go go Hector!
Finding places for the Topa is tough and the water is rising rapidly by the day! That's me mucking in, think we are gonna need some more workers...
Monkey Business Matthew was out and about collecting promotion material for the Shamanic Tour web page which is coming together nicely. Today he went with project friends Mandel and Courtney to Monkey Island. They seemed to like Courtney's dreadlocks. Nice job guys!
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November 2007
Despite some heavy rain the wood has been drying and so we have now started tarring
The river level is shooting up and it was necessary to move our logs again
In other news, Walter's team have started making the iron joints for us
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November 2007
Today Orison stopped by and the Pyramid model is now good to use. Here we are checking over it
So it was off to the iron shop with Walter to get some more iron...
Then we had to get it back to his workshop...
In other news Charlie agreed to get translating this website into Spanish. Thanks Charlie, soon our Spanish readers will understand what this project is all about!
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November 2007
Today the project bought a boat with a 9 horsepower Honda engine. The boat can carry up to 24 people, it's 10.5 metres long. Hector is smiling because he is going to be borrowing it to move more wood. 300 more Topas expected Sunday. Please don't sink this one Hector!
We will need to think of a name and get her painted. She is only 6 months old and it was a good price at $1000
The boat is being delivered tomorrow at 10am. By the way, the Topa had a good day drying today. We might start tarring it tomorrow
School kids marching again All over Iquitos today children were marching for Woman's Rights and against domestic violence. The children here are from the San Juan Bautista district
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November 2007
There was a funeral march through the central plaza of Iquitos today...
It's raining a lot here so the wood is covered over
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November 2007
To date we have not presented the website to any search engines such as Google because it has a way to go before promotion begins so I am surprised at how many hits we are getting. It's nice to see interested people arriving so thanks to those that have been spreading the word. We see that the people that come here (Blue) are actually reading many of the pages (Green). Wow!
Not many hits on the Spanish site yet but then we need to get a translation still. Any offers from people living in Iquitos are welcomed
20 November 2007 Teachers Strike The National Federation of University Teachers of Peru were out marching today in Iquitos, they are on indefinite strike. Teachers pay here is very low and the government has not done anything about it yet. Consequently the teachers have levied a vote of no confidence against this current government 17 students have taken the drastic decision of hunger striking, I believe they have done 12 days but I am not sure if that's 12 days and counting or just 12 days in the past. (Fasting for 7 days is actually very good for the health but 12 days is pushing it, I've managed 9 days before when I was at the Tony Robbins Life Mastery event in Fiji - you'd be surprised what starts coming out of your body when you stop eating - ugh!!). We wish the teachers well and hope they get their 35%. It doesn't seem right that in a country that has an abundance of natural wealth in forests, tourism and even oil that there has to be so much poverty and hardship
4 giant Masaranduba Trunks arrive The trunks need to be cut up into 6"x6" uprights ready to be used in the platform. It took the guys 7 hours by boat to get them to our site. Good work fellas!
19 November 2007 Balsa wood arrives on site Hector's team did a great job today and we received 300 Topas, it took 3 lorries to carry it all and 5 men all day to get it where we want it. Basically it is all now standing upright so that the water it absorbed in the river comes out with gravity. After a few days drying we will tar the ends to seal it.
There is nearly enough to make the 16 x (4m)² rafts that will hold the central structure. See Construction Phase 1.2 The Topa platform will give us 30.8 tons of lift which is plenty. Eventually 100 rafts will cover (40m)² and this will float the pyramid until Phase 4 (August 2008). After then the Topa is reused out of the water to keep the plastic bottles down
This morning was a nightmare because when people saw the lorries coming over 30 men wanted jobs helping. Sometimes it was hard to know who had been working and who was lying. Believe it or not some that were lying about working even took their shirts off and worked up a sweat to look more convincing. I decided that next time I would buy some caps to hand out - if you don't hand a pyramid cap back you don't get paid!
300 more Topa promised on site for Saturday, we better get raft building soon!
The guys did a great job today and they were happy to be taken to a bar afterwards. Tomorrow Wilder goes off to the jungle again, this time it is to chase after those 20m long pieces of Masaranduba. Apparently the guys stopped working because their boss has kept all their wages I paid him, he even told them it was 'the gringo' (me) who didn't pay him, what a sham! - So we now need to bypass the boss and work directly with the ground crew
18 November 2007 Balsa wood on the move! Today I went to check on the operation to move the Topa because they are now 11 days late on delivery. I don't mind them being late but they cannot give me a good estimation when it will come, it's always "mañana" and the problem with that is that I organise people to be here in Iquitos to receive the delivery which never comes. So off to the jungle...
As we followed the river we got to see more and more Topa that had been bundled into bunches of about 13. Unfortunately the river flow is minimal and not helpful
Then we started seeing boats with Topa on. "It's all for the Pyramid Project" Wilder said. There are over 300 pieces on the move today. Sometimes the boats get stuck on underwater logs and we have to jump in the water to help push... (that's me on the right)
More and more people seemed to be involved in the operation. "Over 10 people" Wilder said. "Two women working and one child of 13 insisted on working too". Wilder told me that he gets paid the same as the adults I thought of how much I miss my son Jacob back in England, he would love to be helping too I'm sure. I know that he and Emily, my daughter, miss me a lot. Well Emily and Jacob if you are reading this, as you know we are building a pyramid out here in Peru - if the Pyramid Project works then we will make the world a better place with a good future for all the children - lots of people are helping now! Love you! Dxxx
"...you can tell in their faces they are happy with the work" Wilder said. The people I asked knew that the wood was for a big pyramid It has taken a team of over 10 people 3 days to move the Topa down the river. One boat and it's engine were lost because it wasn't balanced correctly. Despite diving attempts it was impossible to salvage, luckily no one was hurt in the accident
So by the end of tomorrow the 300 Topas should be in Santa Clara which is 40 minutes drive from Iquitos. We decided to bring them in by truck (2 trucks). Well fingers crossed we get them tomorrow and then we can start building the rafts that will carry Phase 1
Orison stopped by... The model pyramid has had to be altered again to get more accuracy but it's getting there. When this is done we can start working the iron joints. You'll see!
10 November 2007 Jungle Operation going well Matthew is back from the jungle today with some photos and some filming of the operation. Great work Matthew!
This was a 20m Masaranduba tree and what you see there are the beams that will be used for the sides of the pyramid. The beams are straight however they are so long that they bend easy. When they are built into the pyramid the overwater beams are strengthened with 3" iron angle. The underwater beams are connected to the upper beams by 1.5m uprights and 2m diagonal uprights. The flexibility of the underwater wood should allow the pyramid to absorb some of the vibration and dance a little with the river
Thanks to the 20 men working out there in this back breaking work. The beam is destined for a small tributary river around 100m away. It will be tied to Balsa wood as it is heavier than water and then floated to the big river where a boat is waiting to tow it the half day back to the pyramid construction site. This will be next week some time. If you could hear the photo above you'd hear a big "UNO, DOS, TRES!" and on the TRES the men heave the beam another few meters
God Bless the jungle, the animals and wildlife disturbed in this operation
A special thanks to Wilder Ramez for heading this operation, Wilder is a brilliant organiser and strategist
09 November 2007 New Architect taken on Welcome Gina Rueda Fernández who has agreed to join the team part-time. Gina, a qualified architect, impressed us with her knowledge of all the legal requirements for buildings in Peru. Back in July we had most of the designs transferred from paper to Autocad at great expense. Since then the design changes have only been done on paper to keep costs down but now with Gina's help we are going to get everything on the computer up-to-date. This means we will be able to get all the designs online so watch out for that coming soon. Gina will help us improve contacts at the Municipality and introduce the project to the Ministry of Tourism here in Iquitos. Gina has a passion for the protection of the environment so I am delighted that she is helping our project
08 November 2007 Peruvian General Strike Today is a national General Strike here. This time I think it is primarily the CGTP (Peruvian Confederation of Workers). They have issues with the government on pay. Also locally other Iquitos organisations are supporting the strike. A strike here is called "Paro" and they happen about every 3 months, usually just for a day but I have known one last 3 days. Even flights are grounded at Iquitos airport!
Left: Iquitos to Nauta road blocks. Right: Strikers picket outside the Iquitos University (UPI)
07 November 2007 Wood 14 Masaranduba beams received, 4 to be rejected others fine. Will recycle rejects into the anchors. A little disappointed with the craftsmanship of the chain saw cutting and so I have decided to switch suppliers after the second contract is fulfilled. It has been raining here and finally 450 trunks of Topa (Balsa Wood) have made it to a main river - should arrive here Saturday. Today Matthew left early with camera, he has a 5 hour journey ahead to make it into the jungle to film the transportation of the 20m Masaranduba beams which are half a ton each and require 20 men to lift them. They have to be carried and dragged for one hour before reaching a river, it is a mammoth task! Matthew will spend his first night out in the jungle, good luck bro!
In this first batch we have 14 beams ranging from 6.5m to 8m - you can just see them below the surface of the water. Out of the water the total weight is 3.3 tons but as you see above they are built into a Topa raft and so the underwater weight is only 730kg. (The Relative Density of Masaranduba is 1.22)
Night Out! I took the night off and went to the Spirit of the Anaconda, a place to drink Ayahuasca. I drink twice a week and have drunk over 100 times now with over 20 different shaman. I heard good things about the shaman Guillermo at this place so was keen to go there. As it turned out it was one of Guillermo's apprentices that sang as Guillermo was too tired. I met a guy called Jeremy Narby from Canada there, he wrote a book called "The Cosmic Serpent". Also met a woman called Sita who works with the Ayahuasca artist Pablo Amaringo. Spirit of the Anaconda is a beautiful place and typically there are over 20 guests there. Here's another little fella I met....
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November 2007
It's 9pm and too dark for a photograph but we have just received our first shipment of Masaranduba. There are 14 big beams ready to go in the platform. I will check it tomorrow morning
I meet OEPIAP (Oraganización de esudiantes indigenas de las Amazonia Peruana) Today Paul introduced me to a group of students called OEPIAP (Organisation of indigenous students of the Peruvian Amazon). They are young people that have left their jungle communities to study at the Iquitos University. The oil companies compensate the government with a tax which is allocated to support them in their studies. They find it hard to survive on the help the university pass on to them from this tax. We discussed the project and it's missions. I realise now that a big way the pyramid can help the jungle communities is to create a connection between these people and the spiritual tourists who want to live long term (say 3 months or more) with the shaman in the jungle. In this way the tourists can learn the customs first hand and make a donation to their community. It would be an excellent setup for both the communities and the tourists because the tourist can target their gift, be that money to help maybe a specific family or they can provide organisational help in setting up a school for example. (In many cases just ideas can be the greatest gift. For example Paul told me how they had the foresight to buy the children seeds to grow fruit trees that will be ready for the children to harvest when they are older). In return the tourist receives a valuable life experience. The pyramid will seek out communities and categorise their strengths be it to curing a disease, shamanic training or just a beautiful place with rare wildlife. The pyramid shop will also seek out genuine jungle artisan from these peoples. The pyramid will work to find a peace between these people and the oil companies
Thanks David and Lilia Today the pyramid accountant, David, stopped by with my friend Lilia to translate. He explained all the employee costs from health insurance to maternity leave - pensions to family allowance which here in Peru the employee pays. They get 30 days holiday a year here but only 2 bank holidays and the minimum wage is $183 per month. He went on to explain the 4% I need to pay on any income from clients and 5% on all profits. I think I understand David!
Thanks Gina and Charlie Later a very experienced architect called Gina stopped by because she is interested in working on the project. (Charlie helped translate). She explained the 1.2m rule on width of walkways which luckily I already knew but 2 of my rooms are 5m over the legal 25m from a fire exit... the other 35 are OK. She mentioned a few more licenses and red tape hurdles I need to jump. Apparently the pyramid cannot be a hotel because there is no hot water. So it is a hostel. She went on to say it would not have many stars - I said it will have a 1000 stars shining down on it and that was plenty! She said, there are more complications because I am using rain water for the showers which is not considered pure because of air pollution. Perhaps I will have a system to reject the first 5 minutes rain from a down pour if the wind is not off the jungle. Anyway, the water gifted from the heavens will be in the showers! Sorry Gina, there will be no soap or shampoo either. We will also use those little Japanese towels that suck the water off your skin and you wring out as you dry. Interestingly the pyramid gets a low classification and yet it is environmentally advanced and healthy for a human, now why doesn't that surprise me? The pyramid will be the best 1 star hostel on the planet!
Lastly Finished "Taxicab Convertion" page in Missions 05 November 2007 A Belen Boat Builder Today I met Erwin Becker who knows a thing or two about Belen boat building. He shared his experience on raft building... he told me about how his workers now use screws instead of nails and the craftsmanship has improved greatly. He said that they had a new "pride", the kind of pride that makes them feel good inside and have love for their work. This was exactly the same as I wrote yesterday... another synchronicity since I hadn't mentioned anything to Erwin about the Pyramid's vision for Belen
Synchronicities It's the shamanic way to look for the synchronicities in life. I believe we have freewill on this Earth and our destinies are not fated. However, I also believe that there is an alien intelligence that plays with our days like children lovingly play with dolls. Paulo Coelho calls this "The Hand that Writes All". Napoleon Hill calls it "Infinite Intelligence". It seems to me now that the programmer of this simulation called life uses synchronicities to communicate to us. When you open your heart and start to notice this then he compounds them, shattering any illusion you once had that coincidence was meaningless. Before you know it your personal and experiential "proofs", subjective and non objective as they are, lead you closer to God... then you are walking the spiritual path. With faith comes strength and the knowledge that you can achieve anything. "Faith is the antidote of Fear" says Tony Robbins in his flagship seminar called "Unleash the Power Within" (UPW). Faith is a powerful ally and if you don't believe in God then it can be just the faith that you made it this far OK, so take assurance that you'll carry on going. Faith can be grown from gratitude. If you are grateful for a beautiful day or you can appreciate the beauty of nature then faith is yours for the taking
"The children of Belen can fly!" Taken this morning on our way back from Erwin's...
Carpenters Selected The maestro carpenter Orison Aluan Preciado and his coworker were today selected for doing all the joinery in the base of the pyramid. Two carpenters were invited to attempt the "Kanawa-tsugi" (Mortised rabbeted oblique scarf joint), a particularly difficult join which was invented by the Japanese and is demonstrated in the book "The Art of Japanese Joinery" by Kiyosi Seike. Orison won the contest. The join is being used 8 times in the pyramid, 4 times underwater, where we decided to avoid the use of metal. It will join 7" x 6" x 20m beams together and we must get it right first time as much work went into acquiring these giant beams
Orison also arrived today with a model pyramid he has built. This pyramid will be used by the iron workers to establish the angles when welding the iron joints. Orison teaches carpentry at a local school and I am delighted with the quality of his work
Meeting with Moises Llerena Later I met the artist Moises Llerena. I asked him to create an impression of the finished pyramid for us. I particularly like his art and he said it was influenced by his work with Ayahuasca. We got talking about Ayahuasqueros and discovered we had drank with a couple of the same shaman!
Paul McAuley, Matthew & I meet I introduced Matthew to Paul and we talked about how we could get the filming of the anti-litter TV campaign started without having to wait for investment. Previously I'd thought it would need a lot of money and be post 09 September, 2009 however we could start a less professional one and test it on Iquitos
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November 2007
Finished "The Rebuilding of Belen" page in Missions Also finished the Construction section
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November 2007 4th major contract signed with for the shipment of Remocaspi for the Swimming Pool and stairwell trees. Also all the Anacaspi that ties the stairwell structure together. Hector optimistic that this can be delivered between 2 to 3 weeks and he promised to cut the wood inside the Harvest moon Today I worked on the website converting the construction document into a web version, it's a long job! In the morning Orison, the maestro carpenter and his helper came and I gave him the designs for the "Pyramid Model" - this is a 1m model that is to be used to help Walter's team create the iron joints. (Basically it guarantees the joints have the right angles because it holds the iron struts together whilst they are being welded) Matthew was taking shots in and around Iquitos for the Missions section of the web site In the evening Valerie introduced me to Paul McAuley, president of "Red Ambiental Loretana" an environmental group. The group of around 40 were meeting so I gave them a presentation which was well received. I was also fortunate to meet an architect who said she would like to help the project starting Tuesday We had some rain so maybe the Topa team can start moving wood soon
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November 2007 This website went live today so I decided to start this blog. There is much to do before it can be promoted publicly however everyone agreed it was good to get something online at last I worked on the Missions section of the website because it seems the best place to start is the place where we are eventually aiming to reach Walter turned up with his son (Walter is welding all the joints for the Phase 1 ironwork). I said that I would be ready to start in 2 weeks time. It will be good to get these 44 joints done and out of the way. Basically they are unions of half meter iron angle struts that are welded together and strengthened with lots of iron plates. They have 5 holes on each strut and are then ready to have 6m iron angle bolted to them. On the Phase 1 site we cannot weld and so everything needs to be prepared in the workshop. When we get to the site it should be relatively easy to bolt this giant Mechano set together (provided of course that the joints are all angled correctly!)
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November 2007 Matthew went into the jungle and took some footage of the Topa trees being felled. 300 have now been cut and I am pleased to see that they are very straight and that the guys there are keeping to the specification. Wilder explains on the film that the jungle river is too low to move them out so we wait for rain
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