A day in the life of a coolie

7:15 am and the sound of Peppe’s voice rings over the G Kallupatti court yard where 12 exhausted De La Coolie’s boys are sleeping soundly. “Morning, boys..." tends to be the first sound of the day with a variation of either a knock on the door or a tap on the window to wake us up. Breakfast is served by 7.30 and everyone is ready for a hard days work by approximately 8:15am. The group then drags their steal capped work boots to the RTU centre where daily morning prayer is held (only in Tamil of course). As 12 of us file out of the prayer room we are given orders by the great Suravanam (or SS as some of the boys like to call him) on what is installed for us that day. 8.30 arrives as we all separate into groups of 3 or 4 and wander off to the 13 scattered construction sites across the village.

Each house's building process involves a number of steps and a hefty amount of back breaking work! Before any of the fun stuff begins the boys have the opportunity to meet the fortunate families of the new home's. A quick 'before' shot is taken of the family in front of their lopsided hut and then demolition begins! The houses are quickly unloaded in a record time of 10 minutes before the boys are able to begin. The boys tear into the stick huts ripping apart the palm leafed walls and roof. Several surprises tend to make their way from the house's nook's as we dodged mice, froze in front of monstorous spiders and even fled from snakes! Once the house has been teared down the contractor's are called in to stake out the house's dimensions. After what seems like 10 minutes of arguing amongst them, they finally stake out the dimensions with a piece of string and some wooden picks.

After two hours of solid work from 8.30-10.30 Saravanam, Maharajah and Superemani pay the boys a visit with bottle's of soft drink and cashew biscuits. The trio are greeted with cheers as soft drink is slammed down cup after cup! Once the 15 minute break is over it's back to work for the remaining hour and a half.

After the staking of the house, the digging of the foundation's begins. I can confidently say that this step was most definately the most dreaded stage. A lot of back breaking work is put into digging the trenches with a backward shovel and a handle length of less than a meter. The trenches are dug to about 2 feet in depth before large rocks are thrown in. The rocks are fitted into the trenches in order to strengthen the foundations of the house before building. Once the rocks are in, a mixture of dirt and water is shoveled onto the rocks so that the gaps are filled and the rocks covered. A rather dirty job which left many of us covered in mud!

12.00 pm arrives and we stumble back down the hill's to our comfortable rooms. The shoes are thrown off and everyone lounges around for a good 30 minutes before lunch is ready. From 12.00pm-2.00pm the boys enjoy a good rest before heading off to work again for a the final two hours of the day, 2-4. During the two hours break the boys have been known to perform activities such as: shooting each other with BB Gun's, reading books, blast iPod's and singing along, sun bake, play on the children's playground, sleep, enjoy a game of cards, and even light things on fire!

Work resumes as the building of the level base begins. Such a task involves a lot of Indian relatives and a handful of determined Coolie's boys. Firstly, cement is mixed and poured onto the foundations. Rock's are then carefully placed upon each other in order to form a level base for the bricks to lay on. Once the level base is completed and everything is level and sturdy the bricklaying begins! Arguably the most interesting part of the construction process is the brick laying due to the fact that 3 rather humorous brick layers burst onto the scene. With a lot of laughs and misunderstanding the walls are finally erected and the gaps filled in with cement. By this stage a good friendship has established between the workers and the boys as they have just managed to figure out the family tree of the 30 Indian's before them.

Once the bricklaying is complete the roof is erected with 2 carpenter's being called upon. In quick fashion the roof frame is installed and the tiling begins. The roof tiles are laid with a bit of difficulty and the house is almost finished. Several drink stop's later the roof is on and the construction of the floor begins. A rather quick process including a lot of rock smashing and cement pouring leaves the biceps and triceps aching. At this stage the house is one step away from being finished. In the final hours of construction the walls are painted and the doors attached before the house is finally complete. After a lot of hard work, sweat and tears the boys all took one step back and gazed at the masterpiece they had just built. With a lot of hand shaking and smiling the boys were treated to a large amount of Chai tea and spicey Indian pastry.

The day is over and the boys slowly crawl back to the rooms dirty, sweaty, thirsty, hungry, tired and sore where everyone crashes on their bed's and prepares themselves for a cold 'shower' in a bucket of water.