Opening Day in Kampong

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Opening Day in Kampong

November 14, 2010 at 4:34 pm | Posted in Kampong, Opening Day | Leave a comment

Yesterday, we opened our 8th CWS water business in the village of Kampong! It such a fun and busy morning with 26 out of the 29 households in the village showing up to buy water!

Opening day in Kampong!

Kampong is a rural village of about 525 people, located in the Central Gonja District of Northern Region Ghana, 40 minutes outside of the capital city, Tamale.

Little girl in Kampong

CWS first learned of the need for clean water in Kampong from Unicef, who had been working in the village on water and sanitation projects, but could not figure out a sustainable way to bring safe drinking water to the community. In the past Unicef has funded borehole drilling (which is not successful in most of Northern Region Ghana due to a lack of non-saline groundwater sources accessible to drilling) and household water treatment but was looking for a new, simple solution and was interested in our for-profit, water business approach. The water treatment business in Kampong is the first of 5 Unicef-CWS partner villages in the Central Gonja district. Here are some pictures from the past week in Kampong:

Sanatu and Santu (yes they have the same name!) the two women who run the water business in Kampong

Day one of water treatment training: Sanatu and Sanatu rolling balls of alum

Finished product: lots of alum balls

Day one of water treatment training: using alum to remove turbidity from the water

Peter, passing out safe storage containers and showing people how to use the tap.

Shak using the results from our water quality testing to show people the "small germs that you can't see" in the water.

Water Treatment Training Day 2: Scooping the water (now clear!) into the polytank where it will be treated with chlorine

The final product! Clear, clean, (microbe-free!) drinking water

The water treatment centers become a hot spot for village gossip. We love watching the ladies hang out and chat while they fill up their safe storage containers.

Oops! Ladies got a little bit distracted by all the gossiping and started losing track of their safe storage containers! Here are me and our new translator, TJ, using the list of household names and numbers to clear up the confusion!

Despite the fact that the very sight of me makes most babies in the villages burst into tears (like this little guy! they are terrified of my pale complexion...), their Mothers always insist that I hold them. I don't mind

Bucket full - heading home!

This water business is sponsored by the awesome Medfield FitGirls. Thank you to FitGirls founder, Sarah Nixon, and all of the FitGirls who raised the money to support this water business. Your hard work has really made a difference in the lives of the people in Kampong!