5-25 Get Out of the Way and Let Them Build: Boat Race Part 2
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The inside of a rain tank makes for a three-men-in-a-tub style boat. |
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Styrofoam mixed with gasoline makes glue. Or Napalm. You know, whatever. |
Tuesday I went to the Peace Corps office and did my PCV Leader work.
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Lots of bottles make things float. |
I challenged them to be creative. They met my challenge. The music group built a boat around an old refrigerator. The computer class built their’s using nothing but bottles, glued together with glue made from gasoline and styrofoam (also possibly the base to napalm) and packaging tape. The literacy class used the insulation from an ice chest for the floor of their boat and made a frame from leftovers from building the set in the theater. Hiphop and the Girl’s Group used bamboo they got from a torn down nakamal as the structure of their boats. The Fire Squad used shipping crates and stuffed their kerosene bottles in between for flotation. The Sport team wrapped bottles in old goal nets. Nutrition sewed a sail out of broken umbrellas.
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Tearing apart an ice chest to use the styrofoam for a boat bottom. |
By Thursday afternoon, I was mostly convinced we were going to have boats that could finish the race. I was also pretty convinced we were going to have boats that were not going to finish the race. In fact, I was not-so-secretly hoping we’d have 2 or 3 boats finish and 2 or 3 break apart spectacularly or capsize in the middle of the race. I’m all about the comedic effect.