| Humanitarian Architecture—Chien Chih-ming | ||||||||||||||||||||||
| By Liu Yi-wen, Translated by Tang Yau-yang, Photos by Yang Zi-tuo, Used with permission of Rhythms Monthly | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Architects from developed nations have long built structures for people living in developing countries. Such architects typically consult with the end users of the structures, giving them a voice in the final design. Working together, the locals and the architects are able to produce buildings that meet the unique cultural needs of the area. This humanitarian approach to building structures for people in less developed communities is much less mature in Taiwan—but there is a man working hard to change that.
Chien Chih-ming (簡志明) does not fit the image of a typical architect. Instead of wearing a suit or sitting in front of a computer screen drawing precise blueprints for construction companies, he is more likely to be seen sweating in everyday work clothes at an Association of Humanitarian Architecture (AHA) construction site. Chien, born in 1981, is the executive director of the AHA, a non-profit organization that usually constructs buildings in far-off, disadvantaged communities. Such buildings are conceived and designed with the needs of the local people in mind, and are typically constructed using locally produced materials. Thus, the final designs are often a product of extensive and lengthy exchanges of ideas between local people and the architectural team. After all, the team knows that those local people are the owners and end users of the structures. The architects thus strive to respect the wishes of people in the community and not to impose their own values and views on them. The locals have raw ideas of what they want in a building, but they may not be able to readily express their ideas in words. The outside teams merely help elicit these ideas and transform them into actual buildings for use by the public. Due to limited resources, the AHA usually does not get involved with the construction of private residences.
Soul searching After earning his graduate degree in architecture, Chien spent a fair amount of time exploring what he wanted to do with his life. He often asked himself how an architect could best contribute to society. At one point he got a job working in a village near the Shuanglong aboriginal tribal settlement, 1,000 meters (3,300 feet) above sea level and deep in the mountains of Nantou County, central Taiwan. In his free time, he wandered around the area meeting local people and learning their customs and culture. During one such walk, he learned that the arts and crafts classroom at the local Shuanglong Elementary School had been damaged in a typhoon and that the school could not afford to have it repaired. Later, in 2008, when he was serving in the executive branch of the Taiwanese government, he learned that the arts and crafts classroom had been more than just damaged—it had completely toppled. This prompted an urge to do something constructive for the school. Taking advantage of his contacts in the executive branch, he started a drive for small donations to rebuild that classroom for the Shuanglong school. He also extended the fundraiser to circles of his friends and to acquaintances in construction companies. In the end, he managed to raise NT$130,000 (US$4,200). After consulting with residents at Shuanglong, a bamboo structure in the shape of a fruit stone was built. Bamboo is a traditional local building material, and the shape of the seed represents growth and hope. The project started Chien on the path of humanitarian architecture. Raising money for his projects was never easy, at least not at first. His appeals were turned down nine times out of ten. “Maybe my shaved head made people think of me as an ex-con or a monk raising funds to pay back society,” Chien reflected. Aside from raising money, Chien also needed helpers who could work on a project with him for free. “I might not be able to help him much with fundraising, but I can surely connect him to a whole lot of people at my school eager to help with his work,” said Chien Sheng-fen (簡聖芬), an associate professor with the Department of Architecture at National Cheng Kung University. She is a supporter of Chien and his ideals for humanitarian building. Professor Chien has not been the architect Chien’s only source of help when it comes to securing manpower. Since he embarked on this path, teachers who know him have invited him to their schools to talk to students about his ideals and on-going projects. The teachers vouch for Chien and encourage students to take part in his projects by making a working vacation out of their participation. They can mix work with fun while supporting a worthy cause. Humanitarian architecture projects have, as a result, become quite popular on college campuses, often attracting more student volunteers than are needed. For example, a 2015 building project for the Emei community in Hsinchu, northern Taiwan, called for ten volunteers, but 60 people signed up. Such popularity means that Chien and his team sometimes need to tactfully turn down applicants. They explain that they are unable to accommodate everyone because of the limited number of available slots, and that the project just happens to need people with different skill sets than theirs. They tell these applicants to keep up their enthusiasm to help others and to keep signing up in the future; maybe there will be projects down the road that will need people with just their kind of skills. They hope to see them again and work with them in the future.
The AHA approach The AHA does not merely go into a community, build something, and then leave. Its time horizon is much longer, and its involvement with the community is much broader than just building a structure. In fact, building a structure is but a small part of the project. When the AHA decides to build in a community, it first gets involved with the people there and learns about their history, culture, ethos, and way of life. In other words, the team gets to know the people of the community before they get to work on the building. They strive to learn the core values that the local residents share. Shared values are the core strength that brings cohesiveness to a community. “If the people of a place possess common values and demonstrate cohesiveness, then we’re very happy to work with them,” Chien said. “It doesn’t matter if they don’t know much about architecture or design details.” One such undertaking was in the tribal settlement of Taromak, the only community of Rukai aborigines in eastern Taiwan. In 2012, Yang Shih-hung (楊詩弘), an assistant professor in the Department of Architecture at the National Taipei University of Technology, along with architect Chien took university students to Taromak to make a long-term inspection. The team spent close to a year in the settlement talking and getting to know the elders, church pastors [the majority of Taiwanese indigenous peoples are Christian], and children. They discovered that local children, though full-blooded Rukai, could not speak their native language very well. Tribal elders expressed an interest in creating a space where their youths could learn the tribe’s language, culture, and heritage. After a great deal of discussion, the architectural team and local leaders developed a consensus on what such a building might look like. That eventually developed into a final design in the shape of a butterfly, which is the Rukai symbol for a valiant warrior. Wood carvings by students of the local Danan Elementary School were added to the main wooden structure. The architecture team even scoured streams and brooks for pieces of stone slate, a traditional Rukai building material, which they used to pave the ground for the structure. The local people and the university team were thus able to join forces to erect a building that fairly well reflected what the local people wanted in their community.
Social mingling How does an AHA team, hailing from all parts of Taiwan, mingle with local people? “We’d make a bonfire in a clearing at night,” Chien said, recalling those heart-warming hours. “Then we’d sit around the fire and chat away, tossing ideas back and forth.” The AHA team talked to more than just tribal elders and pastors. They also bounced ideas off local children. “We asked them to draw their dream buildings,” Chien continued. “We let their imagination loose.” The children gladly let their creative juices flow without constraint. At times the AHA volunteers wondered whether they even possessed the capabilities to build what the kids had imagined in their drawings. They had wanted a space in which giraffes, elephants, and squirrels could all live together, but the AHA could not very well build such a place for the children. So, to accommodate their youthful imaginations, the AHA team suggested they incorporate into the building wood carvings and colorful paintings of animals that the elementary students had made. When an AHA team works on a project in a village, it doesn’t matter if they are professors, architects, professional craftsmen, students, or volunteers—they sweat under the sun together, take quick showers together, and sleep on the floor together. “Together we harvested bamboo and blady grass [which has very sharp edges], and together we got bitten by mosquitoes and nicked by the grass,” recalled Gu Zi-yong (谷自勇), approaching 60, a Shuanglong resident who once worked with the visitors. Everybody also eats together around the same tables, downing local produce and wild game that locals have caught. Together they share their stories of the day. The communities have generally put AHA buildings to good use, often going beyond the original scope for which the building was designed. In the Duli Story House in Taitung, for example, students pursued leisure activities and teachers told them stories. Then local elders used it to educate students about tribal heritage, legends, and folklore. In another example, community residents held wedding ceremonies at the Mini Reading Room at Luoluogu in Nantou County.
In the local fabric Many of the buildings that the AHA has built for tribal communities or rural villages have used bamboo as the primary construction material, though wood and brick have also been used at some sites. These tribes usually live up in the mountains, where bamboo is the building material of choice for both indigenous and Han Chinese residents. This is because bamboo, if treated properly, can last a very long time. “As part of a course in humanitarian building at National Cheng Kung University, we visited a Siraya tribal settlement in Zuozhen, Tainan,” Chien said. “Their bamboo houses were still standing strong after 50 years.” Before bamboo can be used for building it is boiled in salt water to remove its sugar and starch. Bamboo quite naturally wears down, so the AHA team tries to minimize the wear by placing man-made materials on the outer surface of a bamboo structure, or by making components easier to replace. Proper maintenance and upkeep are also important to make buildings, bamboo or otherwise, last longer. Fixing problems early on can avoid more severe damage later on. The AHA project team also takes into account environmental factors, such as wind or the local climate, when designing a building. For example, because bamboo buildings have been known to be more vulnerable to strong winds, the rebuilt arts and crafts classroom at Shuanglong Elementary School took on its eventual shape and contour to help ensure that the structure would withstand the winds that could come in from all directions in the valley.
Nepal The AHA has also taken its service abroad. At the invitation of Zhang Jing-wen (張瀞文), the CEO of the Landseed Culture and Education Foundation, Chien and Kung Shu-Chang (龔書章) took on a project in 2011 to build a clinic for the village of Jugedi, Chitwan, Nepal. Kung is the chair of the Graduate Institute of Architecture at National Chiao Tung University. When the residents of Jugedi needed medical care, they had to trek 130 kilometers (81 miles) up and down hills and mountains to Kathmandu, the national capital, to see a doctor. Zhang’s foundation decided to collaborate with Kung and Chien to build a clinic in Jugedi to make medical care more accessible to local folks, and to spare them the arduous foot journeys that daunted people seeking medical attention. The project recruited volunteers from colleges in Taiwan. A month before the trip, potential volunteers went to Chiao Tung University for screening and training. They learned to build with bricks, even building a brick structure for composting at a local kindergarten. That was a practice run for the group. That exercise also gave the project leadership an opportunity to evaluate the volunteers. After the second phase of training, five volunteers from the colleges, four technical advisers, and three managers were selected for the trip. The team spent 26 days in Nepal and taught local people to manage the construction site, work with building materials, use machinery, mix concrete, and put up posts, beams, and walls. “To build a stable structure, the pillars must be stronger than the beams,” Chien said. “But Nepalese built their houses exactly the opposite way.” There were few building codes in the nation to go by, so the AHA delegation used Taiwanese building codes. Language was not the only barrier between the two sides. Cultural differences hindered their progress, too. “The Nepalese kept shaking their heads whenever we said things to them,” Chien recalled. He could not understand why the locals seemed to simply reject out of hand all the ideas that the AHA team put forth. Then he learned that when Nepalese shook their heads, they meant agreement, acceptance, or affirmation—not disagreement, denial, or rejection, as is common in many other cultures. The local people had been agreeing with what the AHA delegation had said all along. To facilitate more effective communication with their hosts and avoid further misunderstandings, the team picked out local villagers who had a better command of the English language. Of course, the universal lingua franca in this sort of situation—body gestures—also came into service frequently. Members of the AHA team also experienced frustration dealing with mundane matters, such as transporting building materials. Local ethos were such that the wheels of government bureaucracy had to be greased. For example, they had to pay “tolls” to move their building materials along. Some team members became sick while in Nepal. At first a Landseed free clinic delegation from Taiwan was stationed there, and the doctors could examine the AHA members and prescribe medicine for them. But after the medical delegation returned home, the AHA team could only rely on simple medicines that they had brought with them. Challenges and physical fatigue notwithstanding, the AHA team found their stay in Nepal very rewarding. “After a day of draining labor, a whole bunch of us lay on a suspension bridge staring up at a whole sky of stars and sharing our thoughts and feelings. Those were such tranquil and enjoyable moments,” said Chien. After the AHA team returned to Taiwan, local residents took over the project. The construction of the clinic was completed over two years later. Because of the stringent codes the AHA team had introduced, the building withstood the magnitude 7.8 earthquake that devastated Nepal in 2015.
Money matters Generally speaking, AHA projects cost an average of about half a million Taiwanese dollars (US$15,700), which are funded with donations from the public. When donations do not cover the cost, AHA participants—teachers, students, etc.—chip in to make up the deficit. But Chien is trying to diversify sources of income. Though already in operation for quite a few years, the AHA was only formally established in 2013 with Chien as its executive director. He and its members have since contemplated running the organization as a social enterprise. It has, for example, offered easy-to-follow workshops for city dwellers. “Last year our association offered carpentry and furniture workshops for a fee. All the spots were snatched up in a day,” Chien said. He believes that self-support is a worthwhile and feasible goal for the AHA. While Chien explores his way around the sphere of humanitarian construction, more college teachers and students have joined in or become interested in this approach to building. The National Taipei University of Technology has remained engaged since its involvement with Chen’s arts and crafts classroom project in 2008. National Chiao Tung University and National Cheng Kung University have also offered courses on the theory and practice of humanitarian construction. Chien has worked with teachers and students on these campuses to help them along in their exploration of this subject matter and to act as a bridge between them and potential communities for humanitarian building projects. Chien continues the pursuit of his dream with unwavering single-mindedness. “He has a dogged determination when it comes to carrying out his ideals, despite the fact that a humanitarian building project often poses a lot of difficulties and challenges,” said Hsu Pei-hsien (٣\-¿ºÎ), assistant professor, Department of Architecture at Chiao Tung University. “Engaging in humanitarian architecture is the way I express my love for architecture,” Chien declared. “I’ve never worried about whether a project would succeed or not. I only think about how to keep going. I know as long as I keep at it, things happen.”
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