Batwa community members of Bikuto with Batwa Development Program staff member Levi Besingye (in the motorcycle helment).Hello everybody! It has been an especially full month here in Bwindi as we attempt to get the water and sanitation projects off the ground. My days are generally composed of waking up around 7 am and driving a motorcycle down to the guest house where I will fill up on coffee and an omelet before talking over the days plan with my partners Paul Muhwezi and Tor Erickson. By 9 am we are usually off in the field working for community meetings or project implementation. Field work lasts anywhere from 6 to 14 hours depending on the day’s activities and then back to the guest house to compile notes, finalize community contracts, and check e-mails (and dinner!). I’ve found with all of the logistics and grant management that it has been difficult not to lose sight of the most important aspects of this work namely, community involvement in the projects and community awareness on issues regarding water borne illnesses.
All of my encounters with the NGOs (which are a heavy presence in
I though my greatest challenge here would be trying to convince communities of the importance of the projects that we would like to implement. Instead communities are accepting the projects and in some cases are not concerned about being convinced. They just want what other communities have received from NGOs, expensive projects. Thus our approach is beginning to evolve and we are putting a heavier emphasis on dialogue with the communities.
The focus of our outreach is now more centered on finding out what the communities want for their people and what they know about clean water and sanitation. If projects have been implemented in the past and failed, why? One community that we have been working with has three giant school latrines (provided by NGOs) lined up in a row and only one of the latrines is operational. The other two are collapsing and crumbling. Maybe this is a case of poor workmanship or maybe it is the case of a community accepting a project without being involved enough to insure that the work gets done properly.
Our team has been trying to tease out what constitutes “buying in” for each community. One way I am starting to look at this is what kind of contribution from the community is a great enough sacrifice that they will feel a sense of obligation for sustaining the projects. We are trying to find that balance between pushing a community to its limit in terms of contribution without overwhelming them to the point where the projects never get off the ground. That limit is different for every community.
For example the Batwa don’t seem to value the blood sweat and tears of manual labor as much as their Bakiga neighbors. So while working with them even the hardest labor I can think of, namely digging the pits for pit latrines still does not necessarily constitute buying into the projects. So we are looking for something more, some other way that they can contribute. Whether that be cooking the meals for the workers of the projects or utilizing some resource available to the community we are still feeling it out and fine tuning the process. The dialogues have been getting more in depth and I feel like we are starting to gain a lot of knowledge on why projects in the past have failed.
Mutwa Fergans demonstrating how to climb down into the pit of a future pit latrine to dig. These pits are commonly dug in excess of 20 feet deep leading to concerns about groundwater contamination.
Recently we protected our first spring!! It was a spring in the
With the assistance of the district water officer and about 15 community members we opened the spring up to diagnose the problem. After 2 hours of digging we uncovered a cement box that the spring water passed through. The box was between the eye of the spring (the location where the water originates) and the delivery pipe and was full of gravel. On top of the gravels was a thick mat of very fine dark purple roots. Although a surprising development, nothing prepared me for the 3 foot long root wad that was pulled from the pipe above the cement box as water gushed out of the delivery pipe. The root wad filled the entire diameter of the pipe and was completely blocking the flow of water. With my mouth hanging open I could only marvel with wonder and disgust at how one root wad had blocked this community from having clean water for 10 years.
Community contribution of labor. These women are carrying stones to be placed in the uncovered spring to protect the water channel from collapsing.
We continued to dig up the spring and found more and more purple root mats. We followed them up to a stand of ten banana trees sitting above the spring. Who owned the banana trees was my immediate question which was answered by silent looks over at the spring committee chairman! How ironic! The chairman was even bold enough to ask the community to compensate him for removing the trees though I don’t think the community were having any of it (and neither should they in my mind). The spring is now filling a 20 liter jerry can in 2 minutes versus 15 minutes before the roots were removed.
I have now worked with the Iraaro community to protect their water sources for a total of around 20 hours including education, training, and spring protection. It is now my goal to take the momentum of this successful project to restore clean water to a community and involve those people in neighboring projects. Having this exchange of information makes my life much easier and allows local knowledge of spring protection to be passed on without a middle man. Even misinformation exchanged in this manner allows me to better understand what people know and where knowledge gaps exist not to mention where my own knowledge gaps exist. I’ve always said you never truly know something until you can teach it.
Photos
A muhzee (name for a respected elder) resting after clearing vegetation from his spring to maintain the community drinking water source.
A three way encounter that nature never intended. Monkeys, turkeys, and humans.
Young man preparing aggregate that is used in concrete. This is a simple procedure of smacking rocks with a hammer until you have the right aggregate size. 
Tor plastering a sample latrine wall using ferrocement. Ferrocement is a labor intensive procedure whereby cement and sand is plastered onto a framework of wire and reeds. The resulting wall is lightweight and uses a fraction of the cement costs.
A boy demonstrating a toy created by capturing a large wood boring insect and hooking a stiff piece of grass under the exoskeleton. The child is blowing on the insect to get it to beat its wings.
