Rumbling spirits...

Posted by Serge - Friday, April 18, 2008

The local school sent us an invitation. We received a warm welcome by some 1500 students who spontaneously burst out in the national anthem. Then it was time for the Friday ‘hygiene skit’. For and by the students. This time the skit was about stubborn parents refusing to part with traditional ways in hygiene. The father insisted that a toilet was an unnecessary luxury because there was nothing wrong with squatting in your back yard and that you shouldn’t wash your hands before eating or after doing your business because water is scarce. Because of this, the father got sick and, against better judgement, he refrained from seeing a real doctor. Only the shaman could chase away the ‘rumbling spirit’ in father’s belly. The children were successful in the end. Because of what they learned at school, they convinced their father to visit a proper hospital, build a functioning outhouse and to wash hands with soap and water before eating and after using the toilet. A happy ending!
Or not? Because, in spite of the great performance and ditto initiative, when the teacher asked the children we discovered that it wasn’t always as easy to convince parents who were determined to keep their traditional ways to change. With disastrous consequences: 250,000 children in Ethiopia die each year from diarrhoea after drinking polluted water given them by…their parents.

They came closer and closer and they approached…
After driving for more than an hour on the most desolate road I had ever seen, we reached our next destination. This community lived high up in the mountains. We were given a warm welcome by exuberant singing and dancing women and their husbands, clad in their over-sized Sunday best. A wonderful play of colour, scent and sound. Suddenly I heard a new sound coming from somewhere far away. I couldn’t figure out what it was and I couldn’t see where it was coming from. Until, all of a sudden, from the top of a hill, we saw hundreds of children walking towards us, singing. They kept singing the same word. It seemed like a kind of mantra. They came closer and closer until I understood what they were singing: ‘welcome, welcome, welcome….’ It was a beautiful sight. It made me stop in my tracks. Their gratitude towards us, who had given them clean water and therefore, a better life, was immeasurable. It was a moving gesture, which filled me with a sense of warmth.

Unbearable!
We split up into 2 groups. Sadie felt really sick and stayed in the school. I felt physically all right and went further into the mountains together with a couple of locals to have a look at some different water management projects. We ran into a mother and daughter at one of the wells who were just busy collecting their supply of clean water. Talking to them, it became clear to me that for them, just like for many others, the first step upwards from poverty had everything to do with easy access to clean water. The daughter can now return to school where she will have chances of a better future. The mother will now have more time to plant vegetables, instead of spending 6 hours a day lugging her water bottles home. The vegetables she grows will mean a better diet, growing physically stronger and reducing their chances of illness. Her surplus of vegetables can be sold at local markets so that she will generate her own income, besides that of her husband. Because of this, this family was able to improve their standard of living, bit by bit. By having clean water close to their home.
I wanted to know how it would feel to hike with 20 litres of water on your back. So I took over for the daughter. Went to the well, filled the jerry can, straightened my knees and whoa…that’s heavy! I followed the mother, who quickly ambled up the mountain. After having climbed less than 50 metres, I fell way back behind this 60-year old woman...This is truly unbearable! Twice a day, 25 litres per jerry can, hiking for hours through the bush, on bare feet…my respect!