Eight Hours, Every Day | Mount Paka, Kenya
December 29, 2014
Before safe water was brought to Mount Paka, women spent the majority of their day walking to the closest water source: a sand dam several miles away. It was a three hour walk down Mount Paka and a five hour walk back up, totaling eight hours every day for the women in this remote village.
Kipkorir, a mother of five, walked three kilometers to a shallow pond at dawn and at dusk each day to collect water. The trip was dangerous and exhausting. Kipkorir told WMI, “The women would go out in the morning and evening to collect water, sometimes three or four times total. We would carry the water on our backs. The lucky ones would use their donkeys.” With so much time spent collecting water, other tasks remained undone. “During the dry season, I sometimes even spent the whole day fetching water.”
Another mother named Chebe spoke up, "During the dry season we spend almost the entire day fetching water, and then we do not even have time to cook for our families. Due to water borne diseases we spend a lot of our income on treatments. We often suffer from typhoid and malaria. Getting our children to school on time is a challenge because of the water problem."
Now that a safe water solution has been provided to the Mount Paka community, the Pokot people have a new safe water source near their remote village, eliminating hours spent previously collecting dirty water. With your support, we are able to restore thousands of hours to women around the world as they collect water and nurture their families. To learn more about joining us in these efforts, visit watermissions.org/mtpaka.
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