For the next two weeks, CWS will be working with an awesome volunteer, Abby, in Tamale! After being accepted into last summer’s fellowship program Abby later later found out about an opportunity in South Africa that she couldn’t pass up. The solution? Abby headed to South Africa this summer and is going to spend the next two weeks in Tamale helping CWS with a project in the village of Jarayili! Abby arrived in Tamale this week, just in time for the celebration of Eid al Adha!

After a couple days in the office learning about Community Water Solutions and meeting our staff, Abby headed out with Brianan for her first trip to the field this morning. Abby, Brianan and Peter visited Jerigu, Nymaliga and Libi so she could see how the CWS water businesses work in three, very different villages. Tomorrow, Abby and Peter will head out to visit some more communities and plan to head to Jarayili on Friday to start Abby’s project.

So, what exactly is Abby working on in Jarayili? Long-time blog readers may remember that before leaving Ghana, Kathryn had been working in this community to test out the efficacy of 70 L Safe Storage containers. Unfortunately, as our West Africa Regional Director, Kathryn had a lot on her plate did not end up having enough time to complete her analysis. Despite a few rounds of water testing, Kathryn was unable to draw any conclusions about whether or not the 70 L SS containers would work as well as 20 L containers to prevent water re-contamination.

Now, months later, we are so glad to have Abby’s help to work on this project! Abby will be working in Jarayilli every day for the next week and half to see how well these larger containers work! She’ll be posting more detailed updates on this blog so stay tuned to hear more from Jarayili!