Kijigari's Running Faucets Bring Jubilance, Pride, Relief and Responsibility

Dear Friends of the Azawak,

Please help us raise the 16K we still owe to the construction company, and begin raising funds for a new life-giving borehole.  We need your support, and here’s what you can do: Click here to give your personal donation today. Empower students by matching funds raised by a Wells of Love school event.  Contact Debra Kahn, debbie@ammanimman.org. Help get our Wells of Love program into schools in your community. Run, bike, swim, climb, or do your own creative event for water today, and raise funds for Amman Imman.  Read about Mary’s 12 hour run here. Forward this message to a friend and ask them to subscribe and contribute!

The Kijigari borehole tale continues as the Montessori Well of Love begins to operate.  If you missed the first installment, you can read it here.  Read below how you too can help provide the gift of life.

On the day the new water faucets opened in Kijigari, all the villagers stood, waiting impatiently carrying as many jerry cans as they could manage – tied to their waist and balanced on their heads, and more hooked onto their donkeys.  With a little gurgle and then a swoosh, the first faucets came to life, purging their pipes of the life giving liquid.  Whistles of jubilance bellowed through the crowd. 

Children, adults, and even the livestock drank and washed in the pure and plentiful water.  Families from neighboring communities rode in on donkey carts to fill their numerous empty household jugs.  Hope emanated from their eyes as they brushed off spider webs and layers of dust from their containers – proof of the long months that they had sat empty.  They too knew they would no longer face the daily fear of thirst.

Later in the day, Kijigari school children gathered around their beautiful water tower to celebrate their new gift.  In front of all the village members, they read to us their letter of gratitude.  They then danced and sang a song that they had written and choreographed for the Amman Imman team.  Click here or on the video box on the right to get a glimpse of this  amazing scene of celebration.

The people of Kijigari and the surrounding communities have received a beautiful gift of life – their Montessori Well of Love.  Their awe and pride has now been replaced by a great sense of responsibility.  They realize that they have the power to cherish or waste their superb treasure.  Amman Imman will work hand in hand with them to create the foundation for proper management so that their borehole may provide water for generations to come.   Next week, I will describe to you how the management committee was elected, and how they have been running the borehole since it opened.

Yours for the Children of the Azawak,

Ariane