As we near the mark of 400 wells completed by Water is Basic, it is [...]]]> Martha Siama Edward, a 41 years old mother of 4, has a face that is both beautiful and
strong with determination. Her husband, a captain in the SPLA, was killed in 1997
leaving her to support her family for the past 15 years.

As we near the mark of 400 wells completed by Water is Basic, it is easy to lose track
of the life- changing impact our work accomplishes. Dirty water is implicated in more
than 75% of the illnesses in Africa. When we complete a well we help to create hope in
a future for women like Martha.

So let me tell you a little bit about this amazing woman, Martha.

While her husband was away fighting and endless war, Martha started making and
selling mandazi, African donuts, to support her family. Soon she poured her meager
earnings into other food ingredients and began a small restaurant. When her husband
was killed she needed to expand her business income.

Soon Martha had 15 employees carrying cassava flour across the border into Congo
where they traded it for teak logs; they would in turn carry the logs on their heads back
across the border to Sudan and then the process would start all over again.

Today Martha’s businesses have grown. She now buys teak logs by the truckload in
South Sudan at a cost of 5,000 South Sudanese Pounds ($1,700). She then hires
drivers to take them across the border to Uganda. She hurries ahead to meet the trucks
and handle the monetary sale. In Uganda she takes her profits and buys new clothes,
which she then ships to her clothing store in South Sudan.

You would think that would be enough for any mother of four. But it is not!

On the side Martha is purchasing plots of land and then digging clay from the land from
which she then makes bricks. Yes SHE makes the bricks by hand! She then hires
people to build a house that she rents out, because she prefers to stay in her simple
tukul made of mud with a grass roof.

Why does Martha work so hard? It’s the age-old answer; “she wants her children to
have a future better than hers”.

I think that is what every Sudanese wants for future generations…an education, a plot of
land to live and grow on, in other words an opportunity to build a life.

That is why we have rededicated ourselves to the original purpose of Water is Basic.
We exist to help the Sudanese in their fight for clean water.

Clean water brings hope and opportunity to people like Martha.

On her behalf I thank you for your continued investment in this new nation of hard
working people. This nation needs all the hope we can muster for them.

Yes I am feeling fine but for reasons far from the above morsels.

I [...]]]> It’s 2:30 in the afternoon and the sun is hot, the breeze barely a relief at all. After a lunch of fries, slaw and mutton I am drinking a fine cup of coffee made from local beans in my new REI press cup.

Yes I am feeling fine but for reasons far from the above morsels.

I have just returned from a visit to the Baka Boma. Perhaps you will remember that I visited this area called Agebe in January. This area was a thriving community with very lush land perfect for farming, until 1983 when the second war broke out. With the national park at their doorstep their land became a dangerous place to live as everyone fled to the park.

They would have returned when the peace treaty was signed in 2005 but the LRA beat them to it. With little to no infrastructure who could blame them for never coming back. Except land runs deep in the soul and having some is often the only chance at survival for a people educated in fighting and survival, not books.

When last I was here the newly installed village chief, and co founder of WiB, Mohamed, was sharing his dreams for rebuilding his community. He has plans for a trade school, a primary school and a secondary school. With miles of teak and mahogany all he needs is a buyer and the money will flow.

But still the basic problem that plagues so much of South Sudan was keeping his people from coming home. Clean water is a minimum 10-mile walk.

Yes I said 10 miles!

But that was in January when hope was running low. Today I have returned from Baka where our second well is about to spring forth water. It’s a good one flowing strong and clear at a depth of only 60 meters.

Raphael Youngatu, the under chief, was simply beside himself with joy. “The first clean water he can remember” and he quickly invited us back in one year to see the change this simple borehole will have made in his village. I look forward to going back. There used to be 4,000 people in this area and word of clean water will spread quickly. They’ll be back.

This is true nation building, one bore hole at a time, one village at a time. I imagine the same thing happened in Europe after WWII and in the US after the Civil War. People, who had something, gave to those who had nothing…they gave hope.

As always I thank each of you for understanding this great need and faithfully joining in the work. You get what we are doing here and I hope you are telling others. We could do more and we will as more people join this simple work.

We ARE building a nation together.

We’re still tallying up the total but thousands of dollars was raised to drill bore holes to provide access [...]]]> On Saturday, March 31st over 1200 runners and volunteers along with 100 Carry the Jerry Relay teams competed in the Water Is Basic Carry the Jerry Relay and 5K held in Dallas TX and in Charlotte NC.

We’re still tallying up the total but thousands of dollars was raised to drill bore holes to provide access to clean, disease free water to the people of this planets newest country, South Sudan.

Water is Basic would like to thank the many sponsors and supporters who made these events such a success. It could not have happened without their efforts and contributions.

Here’s a link to the race results in Dallas and the race results from Charlotte.

Here’s a link to the photos from the Dallas race and here’s the link to the photos from the Charlotte race.

Today I returned back to East Africa and our work in the Republic of South Sudan. With each passing year we have become more efficient and rather accustomed to the results of our work. But the work is too crucial to become ordinary.

This is a year of great change! We have survived becoming our own [...]]]>

Today I returned back to East Africa and our work in the Republic of South Sudan. With each passing year we have become more efficient and rather accustomed to the results of our work. But the work is too crucial to become ordinary.

This is a year of great change! We have survived becoming our own sovereign nation and now the focus is on building: building a people, building a nation, and building a generation.

However, in the midst of it all, it is the basics, like water, that a nation must build upon. That is what we do at Water is Basic, we provide a basic building block to nationhood.

Thank you for staying in the game with the people of South Sudan.

As a year-end gift to you I wanted to share the following story for your joy and encouragement.

Recently one of our supporters returned from a personal pilgrimage to South Sudan to see our work in person. Below is his brief, heartfelt experience of attending the opening of another well in another village.

We begin our sixth year of operations by celebrating a new well. Enjoy!

“We rolled into Rubeke early Tuesday afternoon; the village is the newest beneficiary of the work of Water is Basic in South Sudan.  We made the trip to Rubeke to open a completed water well for the residents of this remote community.  The well would be Rubeke’s first experience with a localized, clean water source after countless years of devastating effects of consuming non-potable water.

Word got out that the WiB crew had arrived to celebrate and open the well, and a steady stream of villagers from the area approached the well site along the dirt path. A quiet anticipation hung in the air as the villagers approached and expectantly placed their jerry cans at the foot of the well, anticipating the first stream of water to emerge.  We observed a steadily increasing line of yellow cans.   At one point, a well-dressed woman emerged from a trail and was greeted by spirited shouts and cheers.  She assumed a leadership role and assembled the group in a large half moon pattern around the well.

A village elder opened the ceremony delivering a short speech in the native language, and praying an extended prayer of thanks and praise.  The well dressed woman spoke to the crowd, and then led a round of singing that ultimately evolved into full unbridled drumming, singing, and dancing by those gathered.  This went on for a good 20 minutes.

Then, amidst an atmosphere of dead quiet, the village overseer of this new well removed the locks, and in a few short seconds, locals began pumping water with reckless abandon.  They knew exactly what to do.  They went right to work, pumping water into jerry cans, some putting big metal buckets under the spigot and tipping them back to drink directly from the container as they laughed and spilled water on themselves and those who came too close.

Another well is complete.”

Thank you for staying in the game with the people of South Sudan. Thank you to those who have become one of our 250 partners committed to giving $1,000/year till the end of 2013.

Building a nation together,
Steve Roese
Water Is Basic

But this post war land had no infrastructure and the search for water, any water, had forced people to build their little [...]]]> On September 2, 2008 the Water is Basic team found themselves completing their third well on the outskirts of Yei, Sudan where the population was swelling with the passage of the Comprehensive Peace Treaty.

But this post war land had no infrastructure and the search for water, any water, had forced people to build their little huts further and further from town. I distinctly remember visiting this area while we were waiting for our rigs to arrive from Thailand. Few places have shaken me like these areas. Dry, hot and desperate, everyone I talked to asked for one and only one thing, water. “Please don’t forget us” and “tell people back home about our need” were constant refrains.

Then on September 2^nd water came pouring out of our third borehole! No longer would pregnant women loose their children to worms before they had even had a chance to see the light of day. No longer would children and grandparents and moms spend all day looking for a small amount of water.

Life, through the engineering of a borehole, had come to the Lupapa community.

And life continues to flow through that very same borehole.

This year I visited the Lupapa community on the third anniversary of the completion of their well and found everything in great working order especially the people of Lupapa. Eyes are clear, stomachs are normal, and hope is in the air as the most basic of elements provides a platform for life and nation building.

The system taught to them by the WiB crew is working like clockwork. Fees are collected; markings are made on Jerry cans to prove payment, an account grows and is available to repair the well and pump and eventually to purchase another well.

This is the model working well three years in.

And now others are coming to this community. They see health and businesses and schools and other sources of nation building are coming.

All because a well was drilled in a time when hope was hard to find.

There are 352 stories like these to be told in South Sudan. Stories of hope lost and hope gained.

We are now planning our next borehole and our next and our next.

This visit was short but very productive. Water is Basic is maturing and morphing even as the country changes. I am very proud of [...]]]>

October 4th, 2011 on board Eagle Air flight Yei, Republic of South Sudan to Entebbe, Uganda via Arua, Uganda. Looking over the jagged mountains that our water bottling project is named for.

This visit was short but very productive. Water is Basic is maturing and morphing even as the country changes. I am very proud of that. WiB was set up to serve and help the local leadership, it’s their vision their problem their solution…their new nation.

Accomplished on this trip:

1.   Agreement on two year going forward plan where we hope to create and provide 100% of WiB funding from WITHIN South Sudan.

2.   Secured Lujulo Springs supplies from Kampala

3.   Secured investment funding in Lujulo
4.   Are one step away from hiring the factory and marketing director
5.   Plan for pilot cell charging business are in place.
6.   Meetings will take place tomorrow with Rural Water Commission on establishing program to require financial participation of communities in establishing wells for other communities.

7.   Established a base line of $500/ community per well each year.

The establishment of WiB as a local run project with local control was “out of the box” to begin with. They have completed 350 wells in three years…unheard of success!

Now we are looking to do the same as we establish businesses that build the nation, provide employment, and fund WiB…unheard of ideas in this “4th world” nation.

Here is why we are doing this.

Two days ago we visited the people of ITC well completed on 8/21/2009 ( go to waterisbasic.org for photos). As the women and children gathered we began to hear about how they used to walk 2 kilometers to gather water from a small pond. So low was the water in the dry season that they would wait hours to fill a Jerry can. The process of gathering the equivalent of one flush of an American toilet…was an all day adventure! They did this every day, not so they could flush but so they could survive another day!

This is why you should be very proud of your investments in WiB.

Even as we left the compound to head to the airport, a crew was heading out to drill another well. The other rig is waiting up north for the rainy season to end. We are partnering with A Drop In The Bucket to drill 20 wells in Northern Bahl el Gazal.

We are looking for 250 new partners to commit to $1,000/ year until we are internally self funded. Would you help us find those 250 new partners? Would you seriously consider being one yourself?

Huh?

Let me explain.

Recently both of Water is Basic’s rigs and crews took a very much-needed break after drilling for six months in the Aweil region of Northern Bahr el-ghazal [...]]]> There is something ironic about asking women and children to walk miles for water so that women and children don’t have to walk miles for clean water.

Huh?

Let me explain.

Recently both of Water is Basic’s rigs and crews took a very much-needed break after drilling for six months in the Aweil region of Northern Bahr el-ghazal in the Republic of South Sudan. In six months they completed 50 wells in an area where no other drilling organization has succeeded. This is a region being overwhelmed with people pouring in from the north, as Sudan splits into two nations.

http://www.voanews.com/english/news/africa/Southern-Sudanese-Returning-From-North-Challenge-Regional-Government-Aid-Groups-114484099.html

They arrive by train and truck and foot with only the few things they can carry. Water is scarce with many giving in to the heat and drinking from the nearby swamps. This is a very bleak place. According to Atanasio Juma, our chief drilling engineer, people sleep under trees with nothing to lie on or only grass to cover them up as the temperature drops at night. Your gifts to WiB are life to these folks.

DYK? It takes lots of water to drill for water?

We carry two 5000-liter bladders and fill them in a local river or stream, often many miles away. The water is pressurized and pumped down through the drilling pipe to force the dirt back up and out of the hole.

However, in this area on the Darfur border, roads do not exist that will get our vehicles anywhere near a swamp or river.

So…the irony I mentioned at the beginning…the WiB crew had to ask the local people to walk great distances and draw water from the swamps so that they could then drill a water well!

And drill they did, 50 in all and after some rest and rig refurbish they are headed back for more. That is the heart of this team. That is why your faithfulness in giving and telling the story is so important. To a group of women walking through the hot dust to a swamp to collect water, you bring hope.

Of course this all takes money. The good news is that we are becoming a preferred provider for many organizations seeking wells in South Sudan (http://www.dropinthebucket.org, has asked us to drill 20 for them in this same region) we are developing a partnership with a water bottling company that will become a significant funder of WiB in 2012 and we are beginning to work a plan where past well recipients will help fund wells for those who have nothing. These are all steps towards our goal of seeing WiB self funded by 2014.

But we cannot survive on those kinds of funds, at least not yet.

We need you and your friends and coworkers to invest with us in this great work. As one of our long term faithful financial partners commented to me recently, “I simply do not know of a more impactful place to invest!”

I could not agree more.

Hey it really is life saving what we are doing…and today (or any day) that’s a great return on investment.

On behalf of the people of Sudan…thank you.

September 2010