Ngenge water: Borehole repairs

I'm happy to report that 13 boreholes have been repaired in the Ngenge valley and we're hoping that the 14th is completed by the end of next week. These 14 boreholes hugely benefit the 4000 people they serve. They eliminate the 1-3 mile walks to fetch clean water. They make it feasible to collect enough water so that people use some for hand-washing and cleaning dishes. They foster hope.

The photos, from top to bottom, show the four newly-trained hand pump mechanics, lowering the replacement riser pipe, and test pumping the Chepsikunya borehole after completion. It works!

Ngenge water--training is the cornerstone

Imagine your schools without safe drinking water or bathrooms. Imagine a village whose borehole (well) is broken and the closest one is 3 miles away. Imagine struggling to pay 25 cents a month for your water. Imagine owning a single water container, one that's used for collecting drinking water from your village borehole and also for collecting river water for laundry.

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These challenges present formidable challenges to a healthy lifestyle. Our goal in the Ngenge water project is to involve the whole community and encourage healthy practices in addition to repairing broken boreholes. Water and sanitation hygiene (WASH) training and water management committee training was provided in each location where a borehole was repaired. WASH training explains safe practices for collecting, transporting, and storing drinking water, hand-washing, the use of latrines, and other similar topics. The water management training assists villagers in learning how to care for their borehole and to set up a fund to pay for maintenance and repairs.

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Both training programs used drama, poems, singing, and other participatory methods, as pictured in the top two photos. It is crucial to involve women, such as the five women of one of the village water committees who are shown in the bottom photo. Women shoulder the responsibility for collecting and using water.

Water engineers have more fun

I know that all of you faithful readers have been lying in bed wondering, where does Kijabe Hospital get their water? I know! They use three springs and one borehole. (All four of my kids are seriously rolling their eyes at me upon reading this.)

There is some truth to this blog title. I've looked at some spectacular water sources, way up in the hills and mountains, far above human activities, because naturally it's desirable to collect the cleanest possible water. One of the Kijabe Hospital springs is located high in the hills in the background above the man on the left. We weren't at the hospital long enough to hike to this source. It's about a 5-hour round trip. We did get to visit another spring, Monkey Corner Spring. True to its name, we saw monkeys in the trees above.

The hospital staff is concerned that inadequate water will limit their expansion plans. I'll be helping them assess that concern. In the meantime, one of my recommendations was for them to add chlorination to the hospital water system. The springs are not 100% protected from contamination and the many storage tanks may also allow contamination from time to time. These concerns were borne out by recent failures in bacteriological tests. A hospital setting certainly warrants safe drinking water.

Polygamy and witchcraft

The HBO series "Big Love" and the president of South Africa, Jacob Zuma, have both contributed to bringing polygamy back into the news. Zuma was asked while in England recently about his polygamous marriage, and he attributed Westerners' discomfort with the practice to a disconnect in cultural understanding between the West and Africa.

We were at dinner last night with a South African woman, so we asked her opinion. She seemed to feel that, Biblical prohibitions notwithstanding, there are worse things in the world than polygamy. She wondered which was worse, the frank polygamy practiced in parts of Africa or the de facto serial polygamy of divorcing one wife to move on to the next. Interestingly, she observed that the greatest evil that she had seen resulting from polygamy was its connection, without exception in her experience, with witchcraft. Wives will call on witchdoctors to improve their standing with the husband and also to harm the children of the other wives.

People's attempts to access an evil supernatural realm causes very real harm. In today's newspaper there was an article about children in Congo who are accused of being witches by their families. They are cast out of the family and sometimes even killed. In Uganda, children are still killed for body parts, especially internal organs, to be used in witchcraft rituals. People want to become rich or they want someone to blame for misfortune, and they blame witches. The minister at our church lives on a hilltop where animals are sacrificed and has described going and talking with the people to try to dissuade them from the practice (I didn't get the impression he'd been successful).

Karen

Last of the banquet photos

I like this photo of the boys waiting outside the girls' dorm. Scott is on the right and Chase on the left. We moms had made all the corsages and boutonnieres to order. The boys got called in in pairs to meet their dates and walk them across campus to the banquet facility. Practically the whole campus community turned out to watch and clap as the students walked by. It really was a fun evening.

Kijabe Hospital--numbers and names

Numbers:

• 265 beds (many in the hallways)
• 11,000 in-patients in 2009
• 350 out-patient visits per day
• 40 Kenyan hospitals obtain pathology services from Kijabe Hospital (KH)
• 5 operating rooms; 9000 surgeries in 2009
• 24-inches--about the average spacing between beds
• 10 babies per day born in KH
• $80 for a CT scan
• 600 staff; 35-40 doctors (1/2 half expat's, 1/2 East Africans), 160 nurses
• 30-35 graduates each year from their nursing program

Names:

• Dr. Jerry. Since retiring 10 years ago, he and his wife have spent 3 months each year volunteering at the hospital. He's a pathologist. She entertains children in the pediatrics ward with crafts and games.
  
• Dr. Charlie. After serving at KH for several years, he's now involved in administration and is the only expat serving on the board. In the midst of visiting his home and enjoying tea and cucumber sandwiches (they're British, after all), he fielded a call asking about payment terms for a young boy flown in from Somalia for treatment of a gunshot wound--a glimpse of his responsibilities. (They are treating this 9-year old, both for his immediate wounds and with follow-up plastic surgery to repair his face.)


• Dr. Mark. He's an anesthesiologist who has worked at KH since 1997. His focus has shifted from patient care to training. Kenya has an acute shortage of anesthesiologists. Mark began training nurses in this practice and his second class of 15 finished this February. A terrific accomplishment, but it was Mark's obvious compassion for patients that impressed me the most. As he gave us a tour of the hospital, he continually placed his hand on one shoulder after another while speaking comforting words (in Swahili, but you could hear the kindness in his voice). He's pictured in the black and white photo, above.

Back to Junior Banquet

Scott and his roommate, Chase

Paul went to the dorm ahead of time to help boys tie ties and get ready

Scott and his date, Rachel