Kevin Loughlin, like many college students last month, went south for spring break.
But rather than a vacation spent playing in the water in a popular destination such as Daytona or Myrtle Beach, the 2011 Brandon High School graduate worked to bring clean water to rural areas in Nicaragua. The nation in Central America has a population of about 6 million people, nearly half of whom live in poverty. According to the United Nations, nearly 80 percent of the population lives on less than $2 per day.
Loughlin, who studies mechanical engineering at Kettering University, studied abroad last summer in Germany and was looking for a different sort of travel opportunity.
‘I wanted to give back and help others rather than just traveling for enjoyment,? said Loughlin.
A friend told him about a spring break alternative offered through Amigos for Christ, a non-profit organization that provides clean water, education, and economic development in Nicaragua through mission work. Loughlin and three of his Kettering friends joined about 70 other students, most from Georgia Tech and Rockhurst University in Kansas City, to travel to Nicaragua and work for the week of March 14-21.
The group would stay in Chinandega, about 80 miles northwest of the capital city of Managua. Their job sites, however, were in rural areas to which they traveled slowly by bus on dirt back roads each day.
Loughlin and his fellow spring breakers helped install 10 modern bathrooms in a village where residents are lacking running water and electricity. Many of the people travel to cities to work and are gone from their families for weeks at a time in order to provide for them.
Rather than relaxing on a beach as many of the group’s college peers may have been doing, Loughlin and his friends dug holes for septic tanks, connected water lines, mixed concrete and did other manual labor for a mason, and attached bathroom structures to homes.
Amigos for Christ likes members of the communities in which they work to also contribute by paying 10 percent of the raw material costs. In the community in which the Kettering students were, Amigos had already had a solar-powered well built that continuously pumps water.
Loughlin worked on a bathroom for a home owned by a man named Raphael, who dug alongside the volunteers and brought them fresh fruit and snacks for lunch. On a stepping stone into the bathroom, Raphael, a man in his 40s, put the names of his children that had died.
‘Nicaragua is one of the few countries where kidney disease is one of the main killers because they don’t have fresh water,? said Loughlin. ‘Bathrooms help prevent intestinal parasites, the main killers of children. All these diseases taking so many lives are 100 percent preventable and it just takes money and effort to put those things in.?
Loughlin and his fellow volunteers would rise every day to eat breakfast and then board the buses to the job site to work and improve life for the Nicaraguans, finishing their day around 5. They spent one day visiting downtown Chinandega, which he observed as a densely packed city, with many cars, motorcycles and dirt bikes, as well as open fruit and meat markets.
On their first day in the country, before they had even begun work, Loughlin would have his most difficult physical challenge of the trip? climbing Cerro Negro (Black Hill), a volcano.
‘It was a lot like sand dunes, but covered in ash, so you would climb and slide back down. That is what made it so difficult,? said Loughlin. ‘There was a great view at the top, we saw a lot of different volcanoes and the coast from there. Unfortunately, there was no lava exposed, but there were sulfur vents and you could see gas coming out in a couple spots.?
At the end of each day, the missionary workers would shower and have dinner, usually involving rice and beans, and then in a large group they would discuss their day, breaking down what they had experienced and how they could help the next day.
‘It was a really great experience to work alongside people down there and great to see how excited they were for a new bathroom, great to see another part of the world,? said Loughlin. ‘I grew through it, and they grew through it and it’s really great they will have this bathroom to help them. I met a lot of people from all over the country and now I have a lot of great friends.?