Life Giving Water
Team Hope’s new borehole in South East Kenya is changing the lives of children and their communities.
How many times have you turned on a tap or used water in some shape or form today do you think? Maybe you showered this morning? Hopefully you have had a cuppa or two or a big glass of water at least. Some of our most basic and essential daily activities require water like washing our teeth and hands and of course flushing the toilet!
According to Uisce Éireann, the average person uses approximately 133 litres per day. Imagine 133 litre bottles of water in your shopping trolley and now imagine getting it home multiplied by the number of people in your family!
Unfortunately, so many people in our world don’t need to imagine this as approximately 2 billion people still don’t have access to safe running water in their homes.
In South East Kenya, Team Hope has a new project that is helping to get safe running water to communities. On December 12nd 2023, in Nzewani Community, water started flowing freely for the first time from 200 meters underground!
The new borehole was celebrated as the best Christmas present ever for the 1,800+ children living in this community – a gift that will keep on giving for many years to come.
Prior to the installation of the borehole, the distance that people had to walk to collect water took approximately 3 hours and the number of times that journey was made depended on the number of people in a family and the different water needs – including for livestock and crops.
Collecting water is traditionally the role of women and girls in Africa and each person carries between 10 and 20 litres; sometimes on their heads or in a wheelbarrow and most often using donkeys or ox-carts pulled by oxen. Prior to the installation of the borehole, the distance that people had to walk to collect water took approximately 3 hours, multiple times a day.
With this new access to water the cycle begins to improve the lives of children in Nzewani community and to give them hope to be able to fulfil their holistic potential free from the injustice of poverty, discrimination and inequality.
So when we are enjoying our next cuppa maybe we can think about and share with others the many ways that water can change people’s lives and maybe you might even consider helping us to dig more boreholes for children!