Paul's Reflections

October 31, 2010

Nigeria trip thoughts by Paul Nelson

I think today is Halloween – although I’m not completely sure as I’m losing track of time. The past three days have really been quite amazing. I’ve split off from the group and have been off looking at water issues and potential projects. However, before I get to that I do want to note two special experiences that do not fit under the theme of water. First, whenever we stop, children gather about 5 to 10 yards (or maybe I should say 2 to 3 meters) away just out of reach as if they are not too sure about you. However, if you say hello or start shaking hands they come right up – but what I really found is that they love to look at the family picture I brought along. Within seconds there are 20 to 30 of them pressing close to get a look. They get quite excited about Angie with her bright blond hair - So Angie, if you’re reading this, you’re a hit.

Second is the traffic. I suspect others on the trip have tried to describe it, but I’m not sure you can. Today I was thinking that at any particular moment I could see 20 or more of what would be considered traffic violations in Minnesota. These range from driving at night with no lights to driving on the wrong side of the road, to piling a dozen people on top of a sack of grain in the back of a small pickup, to passing a car while it’s passing a car. I think lane striping is completely optional. With that said, I do want to say that our drivers have been very good, and they are in my prayers.

As for water issues and projects, my first two days were quite different in terms of how the local communities seem to be handling the problems – one has quite a bit in initiative while the other does not. I’m intentionally not naming the communities here in an attempt to retain some privacy for those who might have family in the USA. The first day I traveled with Steven and Adams in a small Peugeot whose tail pipe exhausted into the back seat where I was sitting. Adams is the local water consultant to the LCCN. I am very impressed with him, and most importantly he seems to care. The community we visited had three boreholes and one hand dug well. Of the three boreholes we looked at, two are currently not operational – problems with the hand pumps. One has been in disrepair for over two years and no one has fixed it. It was installed by the government, LCCN now has permission to fix, so it should get done. The other broken one appears to have been installed incorrectly… it’s too hard to pump so they finally gave up. The one that is working, however, can only be pumped for a short period of time before they have to let it recharge. They get two buckets of water and then have to wait about an hour before they can use again. Again this is probably an installation problem where the drillers stopped only a short distance into the aquifer such that the short period of pumping pulls the water down surrounding the bottom of the casing. They also tell me that they’ve had to have it repaired more than 10 times since it was drilled two years ago. So again it seems to be a construction problem. This borehole also goes dry in the dry season, as does the hand dug well. When that happens they go to the river a few kilometers away for water. When we arrived they had just finished applying new concrete around the base of the hand dug well and had it roped off. So they seem to take ownership of that structure, which make some sense since it’s been the most reliable for them.

I was also taken up hill to the medicine dispensary building. They say they get about 5 people a day. There is no water there. Nearest is one of the broken pumps about ½ mile away or the hand dug well. The young man working there also pointed out that there is a stream a few kilometers away in the opposite direction. It’s pretty dry now, but I also noticed drainage rivulets through the sandy area surrounding the dispensary. The young man said the people do sometimes get water from these to wash while they are at the dispensary. I asked if they had a latrine for people to use when they visit. The young man shrugged his shoulders and said they just use the woods. Adams sort of scolded him for not having one. They have had cholera in this area as recently as September.

The next day we went to one of the Global Health Ministry Community Based Health pilot project sites. They are just kicking it off so we got to meet all the important people in that area including the tribal chief. Lots of speeches and stuff and they had a very nice lunch for us. This was a village with about 8 small surrounding villages ranging in population from 300 to 1,800 for a total population of about 7,000. The surrounding villages range from 1 to 5 kilometers away. There are only four boreholes serving all of these villages. One was broken but a man was working on it. Turns out he has learned to do repair by watching when they have had repair people come out in the past. Same is true at one of the other villages with a borehole – two young men have a brother who works for the water board that taught them to do pump repair. Only problem is that in the one borehole that has galvanized iron piping they are not always able to put back together with all of the pipe sections. They have gone from having a hole 12 pipe sections deep to 6. A fix however may be as simple as getting them the tool to re-thread pipe when they have to cut it for any reason. They say the chain breaking is one of the most common problems so they could also use some grease and a grease gun and some training that they need to keep it greased. So the young men in this community have some initiative and some improvement could possibly be made by getting them a little more training and some additional tools. It would also be good to help them figure out a way to better finance. When asked how long the borehole is inoperable once it breaks, it sounds like it might take them a couple days to as much as 5 days to get it working again. In the interim they use the local stream water – untreated. When the local project manager asked about the disease risk, the reply was a shoulder shrug and the statement “this is Africa.” Potentially what we could do here is change the way they raise money for repairs. Instead, maybe we could get them to keep some supplies of the most common problem parts on hand, so they can get it repaired right away, and then they are only raising finances to replace supplies. The more they can keep the boreholes in operation the less exposure they’ll have to water borne diseases in the stream water.

Finally, went to church today in Pella with others from Global Health Ministry. Beautiful location in the mountains. It was a lot of fun. Services are a bit more lively than at Lyndale Lutheran. In addition, the Youth League had some sort of project competition after the service- so there was quite a gathering. We had lunch outside the pastor’s home under the mango tree and the temperature was very pleasant. All in all a very good day.

Peace,

Paul