Due to weather problems, I arrived in
Louisville KY at about 2:30am this morning instead of 8:45pm last night. I got
about 3 hours sleep after spending 8 hours in the Chicago airport. The good
news is I got to spend some serious time with my email inbox, reducing it from
180 emails down to 4.
Darrell had to be here early, so we left about
6:30 am this morning, arriving at the Edge Water Purification Training in time
for him to help set up some things. It took me a good hour to finally come
awake.
Of course I'm new to this whole "Let's bring
fresh water to the world" movement. And like many people new to anything, I want
to get right down to business. Show me these water purifiers, then send me out
into the world to install them. I'll bring my own socket set.
Well, it turns out there is a little more to
it. Showing up in technologically inexperienced cultures and dropping off
machinery is not a good idea. We learned a lot about the cultures we will work
with. We received a lot of basic nutrition information that we can pass on to
the people who will have the water purifiers. The Edge folks have experience,
and they have found that preparation and education are even more important than
the technology. An advance team goes out (if possible) and does a lot of
education about water issues and health. Sometimes the people don't even know
that the water is the problem. Individuals from the area are recruited to receive special
training to run the machinery. It's easy to run, but then again we are used to
running all sorts of machines.
Sometimes a powerful person in a village might
be tempted to take over the machine and try to sell water. In order to head-off
this possibility, the leaders are told that the water must be free, but they can
make ice, snowcones, and similar things which can be sold.
Only when they are ready will we actually
install the water purifiers.
The first step is an evaluation of the existing
water supply. Edge uses inexpensive bacterial water testers.
Fill the bag half full with water. Mix in one of
the silver bags and seal it. If the water turns dark immediately, that's bad
JuJu. If it turns dark overnight, that's still not good. Clean water will stay
clear.
So all had to go out and test water that we
found around the facility. Most people went straight to the pond.
I know what it looks like, but I got it out of the
pond!
All the bags waiting overnight. We'll know how
dangerous the water is tomorrow. Interestingly, the color is not that important.
Some colored water might just have a little dirt in it. Dangerous water can be
as clear as the water coming out of your sink. The bad little bugs are too small
to be seen.
At lunch we heard from a man who
is from Sierra Leon. He has been in the United States for about a decade. He
went back recently, and he ran out of bottled water. He was forced to drink from
a local hand-dug well that made him very sick. He will be leading a team going
back to give the local people a water purification unit.
I found that
almost 2 million people (95% children) will die this year from simple diarrhea.
Nothing more than our children get, but they have no means to keep them
hydrated, so they just die. So I'm wondering if when we install one of these, we
can look at the children playing and say to ourselves, "Those children have a
chance now."
To close the day we had a
demonstration of the purifying units. We looked at the parts, the operation, and the
assembly. The unit itself fits into a small box. You buy plastic tanks and pvc
pipes in country. It's easier than shipping, and you support the local economy.
The system works by creating Chlorine out of salt. More about that tomorrow.
The purifying unit simply hangs on a plastic drum
with a spigot at the bottom.
Tomorrow: We go outside and have
to put some of these bad boys together ourselves. Then they break them and we
have to identify the problem and be able to fix them. Should be interesting!
rlp
