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Community VoicesGurdoud Tebeldi
When
FAR's Water & Sanitation Manager Mohammed Azraq and water advisor
Chris Rupke arrived at a community meeting in Gurdoud Tebeldi they
mistook their glasses of water for lemonade. They had met together to
discuss the water situation. FAR was proposing to construct a water
catchment system for the roof of the village school that would provide
clean water to the students and teachers. Although the majority of the
community whole-heartedly endorsed the project, several community
members spoke against the initiative, instead wanting FAR to expand
their water reservoir, which held the cloudy water Mohammed and Chris
mistakenly thought was lemonade.
Unfortunately, the water
reservoir was not providing adequate filtration – compromising health
in the community, particularly among the children. Moreover, the two
Kenyan teachers who had come to teach in the new school left because
the only water source was the polluted reservoir that the people were
using not only for drinking but also for washing and watering animals.
If accepted, the new system would collect enough water during the rainy
season to provide potable water to the school for the entire year.
Chris explained that the unfiltered water from the reservoir was making
the children sick. Several community members continued to voice their
disagreement until a community leader stood and spoke: “If the
children are healthy, they will be happy; if the children are happy
their mothers will be happy; if their mothers are happy, their fathers
will be happy; and if their fathers are happy we will all be happy”.
These
words opened the community to the roof catchment project. Today the
school is thriving. Construction of the catchment system began June
1st and is now complete. The Kenyan teachers returned to their jobs as
soon as clean water was available. This fall, on their first day back
to school, Gurdoud Tebeldi’s children were greeted by full tanks of
clean, clear, water.
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