WINSTED – Twenty-two volunteers from the First Church of Winsted have helped complete a housing project in Oaxaca, Mexico, where 35 families live off what they can find in a dump.

The volunteers, mostly teenagers and a half-dozen adults, were there from July 19-26.  During that time, they built the last of of 28 small cinder block homes for the development.  The project was spearheaded by Simply Smiles, a nonprofit organization based in Central Connecticut that looks to improve the lives of impoverished children.

This was the third straight summer the church had organized a trip to Oaxaca, a city of 258,000 in southern Mexico.  Those who have gone each year say they have slowly grown accustomed to the deplorable conditions in which the natives live.

This year, the volunteers walked through the dump, where they observed some 50 unhealthy-looking dogs and vultures flying above them.  Methane gas is burned as it leaves the soil.

“The smell is real bad,” said volunteer Debby Kane, adding she felt like gagging.  “It’s hard to even conceptualize how bad it is.”

Michael Wu, the church pastor, said the first year they were there, they appalled the locals with their constant use of disinfectants and paper towels to wipe everything down.  This year, the smell from a dead mouse or a clogged toilet hardly bothered them.

The volunteers stayed in an orphanage.  Some slept in bunk beds, while others laid on thin mattresses on the floor.  No one got their own room.  The children who live there share socks and underwear and have few toys.

The trips have given the volunteers a greater appreciation for what they have here.

“I look around here and I go, ‘What the heck are we all worried about?” said Thomas Mazzei.  “They got it  lot worse than I do.  May be I should stop worrying so much an go with the flow.”