Community Walkabout

Monday was a public holiday - Youth Day - but we went to meet with the Senior Headman who represents the traditional tribal chief in this area. He took us for a walking tour through several villages (4-5 houses in each one) under his jurisdiction. In each one we sat and met with the owner of the village and heard about their problems and concerns in the community. Most common was the poor infrastructure in relation to schooling, health care and water supplies. Also the number of orphans resulting from the AIDS pandemic that these families are looking after and which are putting a strain on their households. As we moved from village to village we saw their fields of crops growing - maize (corn), sweet potatoes, cassava, green beans and ground nuts (peanuts) - some in good condition and some not; the problem in the latter being a lack of money to buy fertilizers.

One of several villages we visited

We also saw a great variety of water sources - small streams, hand-dug wells in the village and drilled wells with hand pumps in a central location for all to use. The latter are spread very far apart so if people want the better quality water from those they have to walk very long distances.

A hand-dug well which requires water to be drawn with a bucket on the end of a rope.

At the end of the tour we were shown one well drilled in October 2006 which (apparently) stopped working with-in a couple of weeks so they had wired up the pump to prevent the kids playing with it. Later in the day we were mulling over that and decided to go back to that well with some tools to see if we could figure out the problem. We took the wire off the handle, started pumping it and out came a good stream of water !! We can only assume that the well was not drilled deep enough so dried up very soon after being done, being that it was the dry season and the water table low. Now that it is the rainy season the water table is up and so it is "working" again; so we'll see how it stands up after a week in operation. (Note : by the time we left the area ten days later this well was having problems again. It would provide a good flow of water from early in the day until mid-afternoon and then dry up. By the next morning it would be okay again. There could be any number of reasons for this - the well, or cyclinder, not deep enough; the well not finished properly thus the recovery rate being hindered; or that the flow rate was not sufficient for the volume being drawn out.)

Much later that evening Tony and his wife, Debbie-Lynn, arrived after driving through from Zimbabwe. Good to see them both and we sat up quite late chatting and catching up.

Tuesday was a bit of a down day. We had to go into Kabwe to get food supplies - unfortunately no decent supermarket in Kapiri which is much closer. Later Logan and I went back to Kabwe for the weekly Tuesday volley ball game at the Moyer's house. Many of the local missionaries and some farmers show up so it is a good opportunity to meet and connect with a bunch of people. There were about 16 players (and a few spectators) that evening so we rotated out and all got to play. Four games in all so it was a good work-out and a lot of fun. Milt and Harley had gone for a ride around the area on the motor bike - just a small 125 CC unit - which they said was a lot of fun.