THE NEXT STATION IS OVAL - Part 2

But the most inspiring and enriching part of my life at WaterAid was the opportunity to meet with communities living in remote areas of their respective countries or in highly uninhabitable urban settlements. What was most inspiring about meeting them was how they saw hope for a better life, just because of access to water, sanitation and hygiene. 

There are several incidents that I can recount. There was a woman in Ethiopia who said that when she delivered her child during one of her routine 7 kms walk to fetch water by the wayside, for a fraction of a moment, she wondered if she should take the child home or the water as her three young children were waiting home for the water and she could not possibly carry both, the water and her new born kid ; an old and blind woman in Mali who had been living on the fringes of her village who said that her dignity had been restored because she now had access to water and threw aside her walking stick to sing and dance for us, just to appreciate our effort ; the nearly eighty year old blind woman chief in a village in Zambia who was delighted that once all houses had toilets, she had not seen a recurrence of diarrhoea or diarrhoeal deaths in her village ; of the bright teenager Dolly in the informal settlement in Korail, home to a million people in Dhaka who was running an enterprise with her young friends selling sanitary napkins and other itmes, who dreamed of a better education and career; of people living in an unauthorised slum in Kampala who said that they knew their rights and can negotiate with their municipalities; of a woman in Malawi who said that she wanted her children to know what rights are and how to hold their governments to account.

There were amazing leaders as well - the woman leader Jane in Accra, Ghana who transformed her neighbourhood with sanitation provision and was dedicated to pursue this even though she had lost a local election; a young couple who enthusiastically promoted ecosan in Malawi as means to promote better agriculture; of wheelchair user Amrita in Nepal who poignant story of her struggle with accessing education and basic facilities like sanitation reverberated through the conference venue in Kathmandu during the South Asian Conference on Sanitation ! And even some gender stereotypes that were challenged as in the case of a male teacher in Uganda who actively got adolescent boys to be engaged with promoting menstrual hygiene.

For that, I will forever be indebted to our various partner organisations, over 500 of them, who connected us to these communities through their programmes. Many of the partner staff belonged to the local communities and hence had a very strong rapport with them. Their knowledge of the lives, the culture, the traditions and the local history was so enriching and informative ! Most partners worked in very challenging circumstances - faced with hostile environments, inaccessible communities, poor infrastructure, difficultly in recruiting and retaining staff - yet, they chose to persevere and make progress !

Of course, there was lots of dancing and singing as well, which was part of the visits to communities, as their way of wholeheartedly welcoming visitors to their village. So whether it was Tanzania or Malawi or Burkina Faso, dancing was an absolute must - of course, I was always high on enthusiasm and low on talent ! Or the memorable experience in Timor Leste when a group of three middle aged women accompanied us all throughout our village visit playing the local musical instruments - a version of a girl band ! Nigeria always had to do things in a very special way. I was quite overwhelmed (and slightly embarrassed) with a couple of formal and rather grand welcomes that had been organised with professional dancing troupes who performed traditional dances from various parts of the country. One country where I did not dare to dance much was Ethiopia - it was too difficult to try any of their body moves without risking serious neck and back injuries ! My comfort zone was obviously in India, singing and dancing to Bollywood tunes !!!


(To be concluded....)