Dear Supporters,
We wish you all a fantastic 2014!
We have been a little bit silent recently as we are busy coordinating the global field trial and the shipping of your units among others. Now finally, please enjoy an update.
Units for pledgees
The GravityLights have left the factory and have embarked on the first stages of their journey to you. The lights are being sea-freighted to warehouses in the UK and USA, from where they will be dispatched to all individual pledgees.
We are expecting pledgees in the UK, Europe, USA and Canada to receive their units at the end of February to early March.
If you are living in any country not covered above (rest of the world) we are also aiming for a late February into March delivery date to you. However, this will vary from destination to destination and is subject to change, due to the diversity of the delivery addresses we are sending to.
We apologise the delivery dates given previously have shifted by a few weeks. This is due to the recent Christmas logistic madness and customs hold-ups.
We will keep all supporters updated, as and when areas are dispatched, on twitter @GravityLight, facebook and deciwatt.org/the-journal.
Social impact
In developing countries the GravityLights and SatLights for our user trials started to arrive in late November. The first feedback we have received from our triallists is extraordinary. GravityLight is indeed really improving people’s lives.
We could not resist sharing a few stories with you which have been written by our trial partners:
Liberia
John David is a janitor and lives in the center of the local village. He’s one of the elders and well respected. John struggled a little with the instructions and had a few folks offer opinions, but a younger girl, Sieh, seemed pretty switched on and was able to help with most steps. As you’ll see from the pics, most of the village kids were pretty interested in what was going on. […] John’s got light now: “I feel happy about it… my environment won’t be dark”.
Quaqua (pronounced kwi-kwi) is a 22yo high school student who is a caretaker and groundskeeper at the school. He is a primary breadwinner in a family of 12 as well as attending school full time. Quaqua’s father had a stroke a few months ago and is housebound, so they rely on light, particularly during the wet season. About half of the family’s expenditure is spent on lighting/electricity. The device itself seemed to be a hit, especially the sat lights.
Guatemala
Story taking place during a presentation of the GravityLight in the Guatemalan jungle, as reported by our local field partner:
[…] Let me tell you they were a HUGE hit. They had selected 11 families, so we had to placate 3 of them with excellent solar flashlights, more compact and brighter, but every single one wanted the Gravity Light. […] They laughed about how simple an installation this was compared to the many difficult challenges they face. [...] They followed every step my instructor took with great enthusiasm. She strung the Sat Lights into the 2nd room and they were thrilled. […] They have all hung even the Sat Lights high, and keep them in place to make it possible to move about their small homes during hours of darkness.
Philippines
Mr. Primitivo Saldua is a Carpenter, he is among the residents in Barangay Tiguma, Pagadian City that, ever since, had not enjoyed electricity for the reason that they simply cannot afford it. He lived with her wife and two sons who were both carpenters too. There are about a hundred families living in this area that has no electricity and somehow managed to live with it for the last 15 years.
The Gravity Light was easily Installed, and ready for use.
Mr Primitivo Saldua was amazed of how it can illuminate his small shanty and how handy it is and easy to use.
“Thanks to the Gravity Light, now we can enjoy light in my house for free. My neighbors came and were delighted to see it. This device can help us, we won’t need to buy kerosene for our lamps, we no longer fumble in the dark and we can now enjoy talks with the family under the light of the Gravity Light.”
India near Pune
On https://ixg.jux.com/ you can read about a field trial in another Indian trial in the tribal hamlets of Jamunamarathur in Jawadi Hills, Tamil Nadu.
Updates and general questions
Again, to receive more frequent updates have a look at our twitter, facebook and our website.
We also began a short FAQ page on our website. It answers your many questions on availability for purchase, distribution, use in classes, etc.
Supporters involvement
We are constantly receiving general enquiries and interesting suggestions from people, which is very welcome, so please keep it going. Not unsurprisingly we have a backlog, so please bear with us as we address these alongside all the other aspects of our ever-demanding project.
We plan to launch an online forum for your shared comments in the coming weeks.
To conclude we wish you the best of luck for your projects in 2014 and once again, thank you so much for your continued support and patience.
The GravityLight team