How to Mix and Pour Concrete Floors by Hand in Nepal
Back-breaking concrete mixing
How do you pour concrete to build a new second floor on a house in Kathmandu, Nepal? By hand. Yes, every single ounce of cement is mixed, moved, and set by hand.
First, the concrete ingredients are put into the mixing hopper. Gravel, sand, water and cement mix are all shoveled in with hand labour – not even wheelbarrows are used! Gravel is shoveled by two people (one working the shovel, the other using rope to help) into a basket strapped to the body of a third laborer who walks it to the hopper.
Read MoreSpring Clean: A New Back Yard
Out with the weeds!
It took three truck-bending trips, but I just removed six thousand (6,000!) pounds of concrete from the back yard of my house. This was just the beginning of the rebirth of my lawn from post-industrial wasteland into a green oasis of beauty and serenity.
I did not start out to move so much concrete. At first, I just wanted to take out the sidewalk along my fence line, and replace it with a meandering path between a flower bed paralleling the fence, and through a yard of lush green grass. But with any household improvement, sh*t happened.
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