Day 2 - Survey, School and Well

A very busy day! We started off by visiting the village of Mtonga. Here we met the village chief who had a list of families we were to visit. All houses were no more than just mudhuts.

In the first house lived an elderly disabled bedbound man. Seeing his condition was emotional to say the least. Unable to pay for medication and to look after himself, he lay helpless on his bed in his mudhouse. In the second house lived a mother of 4 who made a mere 10,000 shillings a month weaving straw mats. The third family we saw was truely inspirational; the man was disabled with a disfunctional leg. However, he had made a mere living from hand making cocunut carving devices. However, when asked what were his needs and how we could help, he replied with gratefulnees and humbleness. He was content with his life and it set me back. We left purchasing 2 of his cocunut devices.

We then left for a school building project. A new extension was being built by Islamic Help. Schools here are simply put just an empty room with desks; no labs, no or very poor toilets, no water and electricity, no canteen and no sports equipment. The extension was vital for the decaying school building barely having space for its students. We helped build the foundations of the ground and cement the walls.

We then left for what I believe to be my highlight of the mission; the well. Islamic Help had identified locations of 2 wells to be dug up. When we arrived to one of them, it had already reached around 12m down. I climbed down the dangerous walls of the narrow well and instantly felt the heat hit me. The gorund temperature was around 35 degrees but down the well it may have been almost double that. Nevertheless, we dug away with no safety equipment, just like the locals. We were also bare footed as our boots may damage the the walls and the holes made to climb down. Adrenaline hit; we knew the importance of this well and it's reward. We endured the tough conditions and dug away.