latrina abonera

The Women's Center finally has a bathroom facility. And not just a regular facility- a dry composting toilet!! The latrine is like an outhouse, but rather than being over the top of a hole, it is over a concrete box (shown above). The stool is open in the back, like a regular outhouse, but the solids fall down into a compost bin that is sitting below in the box.

When the compost bin is full, it will be put to the side to continue composting (we add leaves, sawdust, ashes, etc. each time we go number two) and an empty bin put under the hole. Urine will be diluted with water and used as fertilizer (an excellent nitrogen source, urine also has phosphorus, potassium and many minerals).

The reason I wanted this style of outhouse was that regular outhouses often flood, making a breeding ground for mosquitos. I didn't want a flush toilet, because we often do not have water (and kids always forget to flush, causing clogs, because they are so accustomed to outhouses that they don't think to flush).

About a week ago we had a dedication for the latrine which included talking in the megaphone, a ribbon cutting and picture taking inside the roomy latrine. It was all quite silly.

So far it seems that the girls are pretty happy to use the latrine. The other day we were having a baking class at the preschool and the girls left to go back to the Women's Center to use the outhouse rather than using the flush toilet at the school.