Dear Friends of our Project
2017 has already started with lots of new challenges for the globe. It is high time for me to update you on our progress in setting up this exciting eco lodge project here in Myanmar, where the world spins at a much slower pace then elsewhere.
From last October till now we were busy finishing many details on the first row of buildings so far: Reception with three upstairs rooms, Service Building with a total of four traveller’s rooms and four technical/store rooms downstairs. And most important of all, the first three beach houses in traditional Rakhine style are ready to be furnished.
- see more pics at our blog overview.
Our Special Toilet System
As our eco concept includes the introduction of aesthetically pleasing, technically perfect, easy to use dry composting toilets, we carefully planned and built our first prototype. As we are a holiday place and want to make composting toilets an outstanding feature for our guests, we brought over one model of the Swedish designed Wostman EcoDry toilets. They are made of porcelain and elegantly divert urine from the solids, which makes them all the more suitable for our task to provide a spotless, odourless, black water-free toilet solution for our guests. Their use is very popular in Swedish summerhouses.
Mr. Wolfgang Berger from Berger Biotech GmbH, Hamburg, coached us with our initial planning. Mr. Berger is an exceptional expert in the field of alternative sanitation and has done many large-scale composting toilet projects around the world. When we sent him our building pictures to check, he congratulated us on our toilet construction.
For hygiene the basement of our toilet is constructed with bricks and the lower chamber's ceiling is finished in concrete, yet the rest of the toilet area is constructed with bamboo and recycled wood, thus giving a light and natural feel.
So we are proud to show you a picture of it here, simple, neat and ....working so perfectly with absolutely no flies or odour at all.
- read more at our blog: "Luxury dry composting toilets"
February will mark the start of building phase II where we are going to construct all that needs to be completed by the start of next season: our beach kitchen and restaurant, two more beach houses of recycled wood, three beach houses of bamboo, and a double garden house built of coconut wood and bamboo. As you can well see, we will be busy to the top of our noses!
As all of these activities need plenty of materials, I am opening one blog topic about "sustainable building materials", wherein you can see how amazing old, shabby ironwood can look once it is properly refurbished. Also we want to share with you the challenges and reality we face in resourcing such sustainable materials - and where we draw the line in deciding if a material is sustainable enough for us to use or not. How to treat these materials in order for them to be long-lasting has turned out to be a rather tricky question. Moreover, since we are in the tropics, we must consider pest protection. This usually leads into lengthy research about what chemicals are permissible for an eco lodge and which are definitely not. Doing what we are doing, I keep realising that our high-end ecological products, standards and solutions that I grew up with in Switzerland can't be readily applied here. Instead, many factors that are new to me must be considered. Daily observation of how the materials "behave" lead to new ways of looking at what we are up to and how we achieve the ecologically best result.
- to our blog: "Recycled Ironwood"
Lastly, I would like to turn our attention to our master student in sustainable tourism management, Paul Schreiber, who is doing his intern with us. He is focusing on integrative policies with our village. He will tell you in his own words how it feels to be part of our project, albeit temporarily. Paul has started his research about essential features and aspects of our community and will hopefully develop some useful ideas as to how our lodge can benefit the community best.
- to our blog: "Paul's impressions"
I regret to inform you that our soft opening foreseen for March is not going to happen!
Yes, my apologies for being a bit over enthusiastic in my last newsletter. Delays are much more the norm in Myanmar than anything else, but yet I can promise you that our grand official opening will be on 1st of October 2017!
Until then, I will switch to a more spontaneous, instant blogging style to keep you updated. You are welcome to check out our blog on the website if you are interested in how we are getting on to reach our final goal.
Thanks also to all of you who came and visited us here at our project site. Your visits have been a boost to inspiration.
With best wishes from
Ulrich Morgenthaler & the Arakan Nature Lodge Team
