Another day, another guest blogger! Here’s what Fellowship Leader Hannah Stonebraker has to say about Day 4 of the Summer Fellowship Program:
And they’re off!! As of yesterday all seven teams are out in their villages!
In the morning we heard presentations from two UNICEF officers, highlighting their Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) programs as well as their Community Led Total Sanitation (CLTS) initiative. The presentations sparked everyone’s interest, and resulted in a fascinating question and answer session as we all expanded our knowledge on the sanitation situation in the rural villages.
Foster Soley from Unicef presenting to the Fellows
After a thoroughly Ghanaian lunch of groundnut soup and rice balls, the fellows and respective translators all loaded into vehicles and headed to the field to check out their villages for the first time:
Team 1, the “team elders, ” with T.J. preparing to brave the road to Gbateni, the farthest village. After setting up their meeting yesterday they return today to talk to the Chief!Team 2, “nothing but net,” with Shak, right before they went out and had a meeting with the Chief of their village, Kushimi.Team 3, all sporting their shades, with Ayesha gets ready for the drive to their village, Kpalbguni (which I still can’t pronounce)Team 4, “salaminga snails,” (salaminga meaning white person), poses with the always stylish Peter against the trusty CWS pick-up truck. After successfully setting up their chief meeting in Takpuli for this morning, they decided they would use their extra time to help Peter build an addition on his house!Team 5, “pineapple express,” (sadly minus david) pauses for a moment with Wahab, before they head out to Jabrang to request a chief meeting. Full of anticipation they return this morning to talk to the chief and elders.Team 6, with Lukeman (center), and their faithful taxi driver Hamza (left) get stoked to explore their village Kedula.The team 7 girls, “fufu fighters,” (minus Heather) head out with Amin to Kula. Upon arrival in Kula they found a large rainwater tank already in use, though it only provides clean water for two months of the year. The girls return today to further explore the possibility of working in the village and coordinating with whoever is running the rainwater collection site.
All teams returned pumped for the progress in their projects, as they all get one step closer to providing more people with direly needed clean water!
Today we are lucky to have another guest blogger: fellowship Leader Hannah Hill! Here’s what Hannah had to say about Day 3 of the Fellowship Program:
Yesterday’s agenda was so action packed and so full of excitement that I have not been able to write about everything we did until just now. The fellows awoke with the roosters for their earliest morning yet – a 5:30 am breakfast for a 6 am start. Each team went to monitor water sales at a different CWS village. You can really see the leadership, initiative and creativity that the 28 Summer Fellows have as they go beyond monitoring to fix leaky buckets, bandage wounds, and quickly problem solve all obstacles that arise.
Kendra showing off some water samples in the fieldHudson helping out a small child in the village by bandaging up his wound.
After a rejuvenating lunch of chicken and rice – a Ghana favorite – the teams practiced for their chief meetings and rotated through the lab, testing the dugout and treatment center water they collected from their village that morning.
Kate showing Sharifa and Hudson the ropes in the labChristina, Heather,Xi and Cassie practicing their chief meting with their translator Amin
You can really see how the fellows are getting more comfortable with each other and around Tamale as they spend their free time partaking in competitive games of Bananagrams or exploring the Cultural Center and the town market.
Ianthe trying out djembe in the cultural center
After a long day’s work, the group went out for a celebratory dinner at Swad, a CWS favorite. Whether eating the American pizza they craved, the Indian restaurant’s signature Tikki Masala, or a more traditional tilapia and banku, everyone had a wonderful time. My favorite part of today has been that no matter who I’m talking to, or what I’m talking about, every conversation ends with, “And I’m so excited to see my village for the first time tomorrow!” As I write this blog now, the fellows are headed to the field to see their villages. I cannot wait to hear their stories when they return!
Today we have a guest post from Fellowship Leader Annie McBride! Here’s what Annie had to say about the second day of the Summer Fellowship Program:
Today all seven teams got one step closer to bringing clean water to seven new villages around Tamale! We started the day with a brief icebreaker activity that took a little longer than expected.
The first group quickly unwinded limbs,
While the second group seemed to struggle a bit…
Feeling a little closer to each other and I think a little more wary of partaking in future icebreaker activities, we continued on with orientation. Each group learned how to roll alum balls and the proper swirling technique from their translators.
Ianthe, Hudson and Chris with Shak.Peter, Ben, Nathan, Annie and ChristineSteph, Abena and Wahab.Christy, Karina, Lukeman and Matt watching the particles in the dugout water floc togetherHeather, Christina, Xi and Cassie with Amin.
And then roll played to practice household visits…
Jess, Kelsey, Kendra, Javier and TJ.
After lunch, each team headed out to visit past CWS villages to practice household monitoring and to get a better understanding of the water treatment center they will soon be implementing in their own villages.
Will, Alyssa, Abigail and Meaghan take a break in the shade with translator Ayesha, while entertaining all the kids in Nyamaliga.
All in all, it seemed that every team had a great initial experience in the villages and are looking forward to beginning their own projects. We are very excited to see each of their projects develop over the next three weeks!
After a crazy 31-hour adventure that involved a misunderstood directions, a “staff meeting” at the bus station (which caused a 4+ hour delay), a broken down bus, 9+ hours waiting for a new bus, a new bus, and finally, a 11 hour ride upto Tamale, our 2011 Summer Fellows have arrived!! We are so excited that they are finally here and are so impressed with their positive attitudes, resiliency, and pluck!
The group arrived at the bus station at 1pm this afternoon and we whisked them away to their guest house where they could shower (yay!), eat a big lunch and recover from their journey. Here are a few pictures from lunch-time to prove to all of the caring parents out there that everyone is happy, healthy and well fed!
Some of the boys enjoying their first meal at GILBT, chicken and rice!
Ready for a good meal!
Welcome to Ghana!
We're so happy you're here!
3/4 of the CWS Staff: Ayesha, Amin, Annie, Hannah, TJ, and Lukeman. (missing: Shak, Peter, and me!)
All 28 of the 2011 Summer Fellows have officially arrived safe and sound in Accra and are gearing up for their big journey to Tamale tomorrow. We can’t wait for them to arrive! Let the fun begin!
Hannah, Hannah and Annie arrived in Tamale on Sunday night and we have been having a great time getting ready for the Summer Fellowship Program!
The 2011 Summer Fellowship Leaders: Annie, Hannah Stonebraker, and Hannah Hill
Its been a busy week complete with driving lessons (all of the vehicles here are standard!), planning sessions and trips to the field.
Peter teaching Hannah S. the basics of driving stick-shiftAnnie showing TJ how she's mastered the JeepShak showing Hannah H. how to drive the moto. By the end of the afternoon she was a pro!Hannah S. trying out the moto with TJDespite the few rains we have had in Tamale, the roads to the villages are still alittle dusty....
Although the Fellowship Leaders have mastered driving the truck, jeep and motos, there is one thing that we haven’t quiet figured out yet…
Clearly we need to take some lessons from the Winter Fellows..
Almost all of the Summer Fellows have arrived in Accra. The last few flights are getting in this afternoon and tonight and they all head up to Tamale tomorrow! Stay tuned for more updates!
The countdown until the start of the 2011 Summer Fellowship Program is officially in single digits! The Fellowship Leaders arrive in Tamale on Sunday and the Fellows are just a few days behind them. We can’t wait!
This week I finished up my visits to all of the CWS villages,tagging along with Shak and Peter as they checked-up on Nyamaliga, Chongashe and Gbong.
CWS' second-ever water treatment center in the village of Nyamaliga! We opened this water business in January of 2009 and its been one of our most successful businesses!This is Gbong dugout. All of these green leaves were blown/carried by a stream into the dugout after a big rain storm a few weeks ago. It looks very very strange! Thanks to the support of iContact (Gbong's village sponsor) the community no longer has to drink from this water source!TJ and Shak checking up on the water treatment center in Chongashe. Everything was running smoothly but the community misses Sanita, Fabiola, Eleanor and Rachel!The Chongashe dugout. Its gotten much lower and more turbid since the Winter Fellows were here in January.
This week I also met with Unicef and a representative from the Central Gonja District Assembly who updated me on our Unicef-CWS villages, Kampong, Alipe, Mile 40, Gilanzegu, and Nyanguripe. One of Unicef’s goals in partnering with us and the Central Gonja District was to “build the capacity of the local government”. One way that we have tried to do this was to pass on the monitoring of these water businesses to the District Assembly. Handing over this responsibility to the government has been challenging for CWS because we are very invested in our communities and like to know that the water businesses are succeeding. We have learned a lot over the past three years about how to successfully monitor our businesses and are used to being the ones in control! Despite these challenges, we recognize the importance of engaging the local government and are glad that Unicef has been able to facilitate this partnership. The District reported that for the most part, these 5 villages are doing well. The few problems that they are experiencing are all things that CWS has dealt with before and we hope to help the District solve them over the next few months. A big thanks to Gerry and Judy O’Connell, the Medfield Fit Girls, The Nolan’s, The Reids, and CWS Facebook Causes Team for sponsoring these villages – I’ll hopefully have some new pictures from them shortly!
On Monday and Tuesday I shadowed Shak and TJ as they monitored Yipela, Zanzugu Yipela, Zanzugu and Wambong. All four villages were doing great! It was so awesome to see the water treatment centers running smoothly!First we stopped by Yipela and chatted with SaramatuSaramatu bought some aquatabs since she was running low.TJ did an awesome job taking notes on the CWS monitoring sheets.Then we stopped by Wambong to see Chang-Chang. As you can see, the water treatment center was packed! It was so great to see all of those blue buckets on just a random Monday!Chang-Chang says "Hi!" to all of the 2010 Summer FellowsIn Zanzugu, Azara had TJ and Shak move the water treatment center to the center of town for the rainy season because they have a couple of hand-dug wells that fill with water during the rains. This is one of the dug-wells. The water is still very turbid and fecally contaminated, so it still needs to be treated, but its easier for the village to fetch from the water treatment center when its close to the center of town. So far the new system is working well!On Tuesday, we went back to Zanzugu Yipela and did a few household visits. Here are TJ and Shak taking a sample and speaking with a woman from the community about her water.Woman on her way home from fetching water at the CWS water business in Zanzugu YipelaOn Wednesday, I headed down the Salaga Rd to check up on Chani, Jarigu and Cheko with Peter and Wahab. Here are Peter and Wahab talking with Alhassan's wife (who has recently started helping her husband run the water business), in Jargiu.On Thursday, we spent the morning in Cheko training a new translator (more on that to come later!) and then spent the afternoon lugging 1,000 safe storage containers from Melcom to our office! 2011 Summer Fellows, we are now ready for you!
Community Water Solutions is excited to announce the 28 newest members of our team: the 2011 Summer Fellows! We are so excited to be working with young people who are so passionate and enthusiastic about development work!
