Construction Begins

This is all the raw material for 4 standing frames in one picture.

Getting ready for the taxi to the workshop from the therapy center at Qumi.

Jose teaches Israel and Pedro how to sand the backboards.

Carlos and I take a trip to buy wood sealant.

The team at work varnishing and sanding.

Israel (left) and Jose (right) sand together.

We have just a bit more assembly to go tomorrow. Almost there. Trying new padding arrangement.

You can see all the parts nicely cut, sanded, and varnished, waiting final assembly tomorrow.

A poor quality photo of the Port of Callao in Lima from La Punta (the point).

Rented a truck for 25 Soles (~$7) to take the plywood parts and the wooden beams from Qumi to the workshop. We began by sanding all of the parts. The shop was full of helpers today with Julia, Jose the lead carpenter, and his students Pedro, Carlos and Israel. With so many hands, the work went quickly and was very enjoyable..We had lunch at Jose’s house across the street from the factory, a delicious fried rice with hand squeezed lime aid prepared by Jose’s mother. 
Carlos took me to a pair supply shop about 2 blocks away where we purchased the wood sealer and applicator cloths. Applying sealer to the wood is a multi step labor intensive process, but again with division of labor and many helpers we had 4 standing frames worth of material applied with 2 coats of sealant and a finishing coat of varnish applied and sanded down by 4:30pm. In total the standing frame is sanded 4 times thoroughly. This produces a wood that is robust and resistant to the elements and free of splinters making it safe for use with children. From there we went through the major assemblies including the footrest, tray table and attaching the backboard to the supporting beams. We were able to finish the major components of one standing frame today, and will wrap up the other three tomorrow morning. We took our time with the first assembly as I wanted to make sure that they understand the process and have the opportunity to ask questions. This is the see one, do one teach one model. All day Julia helped me along with Rodrigo (LMR helper with Tourette’s syndrome) by taking meticulous pictures of each step in the production process which will be included in our upcoming SWM Production Manual (Version 2). 
Jose took Julia and I to La Punta, which is a point just a few blocks wide sticking West out into the Pacific Ocean. I invited them to dinner and we had Anticucho or grilled cow heart. It is one of my favorite Peruvian dishes. 
We loaded the extra plywood from Qumi into Jose’s car for him to take to the factory for use in other projects.