Natalie has never been to Africa before, so witnessing her experience Kenya for the first time has been fun. She aches for the same things I do, and is compelled to help alleviate the poverty here. It's our second full day, we arrived in Kitale yesterday afternoon to meet my father-in-law Dan and friend/advisory board member Ron Rutruff. Dr Ron wrote a beautiful book about his experience working with street kids in Seattle called "The Least of These". You should order it.
If you follow us on facebook (or Until Then), then you've seen our updates about John Lorot, our friend who is suffering meningitis in the district hospital here in town. He is responding to treatment, but there are others like him who suffer without hope and have no one to advocate for them. Being back in Kitale reminds me of how many we try to help, but then what is "help"?
At breakfast Dan and Ron shared how they ache for the hundreds of ailing individuals they pass by on their way to visit John's bed, knowing they suffer without care, awaiting death. What do we do? Its been a hard lesson of survival to know that helping the one in front of us is still helping.
Yesterday we went out to Tulwet, one of the 3 villages we have drilled wells with UntilThen.org and Freewaters. I've been working on this project since it's birth in July 2010, and it has taken a lot of learning and struggles to get where we are now- our first attempt to drill in Dago in December 2010 was unsuccessful, but now it is miraculously pumping water!
I can't explain in words the eagerness to see the wells, and the joy to see children pumping so effortlessly. We walked to three of the 6 wells in Tulwet, I drank water from one of them. Barnabas, our project foreman, picked each drill site based on need, so each well is merely steps away from the previous water collection site... next to a hole in the ground that has water in it. I don't know if you can tell from the photo, but this water looks more like that green tinge of a dirty swimming pool. It has bugs gathering at the surface and bears the faint scent of sewage, clumps of muddy cow dung floating along. That's what they use to drink, as well as bathe in and wash their clothes.
Now they collect water from this well! Barnabas reported that before the wells were here, children frequently died of typhoid, diarrhea and cholera. Cholera is a deadly disease, very contagious and nearly impossible to contain and eradicate. Haiti experienced a cholera outbreak soon after the earthquake in 2010. Since we've put in these wells, no children have died!
We've been busy since we got here, but its so encouraging to see the work we've been doing is successful and changing lives. Natalie commented that she never realized something as simple as water could change a life. Can you imagine if your children were dying because they didn't have access to clean water? I know I take advantage of turning on my faucet every day.
More to come, stay tuned! Ever hopeful,
Dalene
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