Okay the trip is nearing an end. So much has happened in a short period of time. I arrived in country thinking I would be looking for a project or two to piggyback the water filters from Abundant Water. I have found that it is not simply a problem of making water clean…WATER itself IS the problem. In most villages in Tanzania, there is not ENOUGH water. Few wells and those that DO exist often have contamination and/or no pumps. SO now the goal is just to GET water to people. In most of the villages we visited women walk for more than a kilometer for clean water. In many cases there is no water in the well for days on end. Even when the government has drilled the well or has a pipeline, there is often only a dribble of water available. Women spend the night hoping for a bucket of water to accumulate in the bottom of a hand dug HOLE.

We spent the last four nights in Kibaha. We went just to visit a man I had met on couch surfing. Of COURSE, it turned into visiting the wells and talking to the women. In this case, there are at least three villages that try to get water from the same hole. When we arrived at the well, about a 25 minute walk from the villages, there was NO water and about fifteen women just waiting around, hoping for water. The house we stayed in is actually plumbed for water and they paid to have the pipes brought that far. They have a storage tank and a water meter just one problem water only seems to come about twice a week and this time NONE on the day they SAY it might come. Most people have been without water for three days yes, no toilet flushing, only contaminated water for cooking, cleaning washing, etc. They collect rain water unfortunately this is NOT the rainy season. I could not bring myself to use their precious resources so I was SO happy to wash my hair, me and my clothes tonight when I arrived in Dar es Salaam.

SO now the question is how do we help these people. One project will not do it, it is a case of sustainability. If this is to work, it needs to make a profit and spread from village to village.

I think the most reasonable approach would be to have a workshop for about fifty people. It would include fundi’s who are capable of doing simple welding to make the pumps, teams capable of learning to drill the wells, finding the “witching” talents, involving some engineers with water technology, and potters capable of making filters. If these teams could be organized the skilled personnel would be able to hire themselves out to drill other wells and build/ install the pumps.

So I will go to Morogoro to talk with people at the University there. It is clear Dale cannot manage to do this in the time he has left in country and financing will be needed. My contact in Morogoro has some people for me to meet so off I will go AGAIN. But it is also clear my body is in protest mode right now. Overextended, not enough sleep and very difficult living conditions.

Sorry if this is a bit disjointed…but I wrote it late at night on my computer when there was no electricity…yes electricity goes in and out..yesterday none for most of the day and night!~