Water Filters
Ron Crane introduced Don Stewart, a member of the Rotary Club of Penetang who is back recently from a trip to Nigeria with a shipment of water filters.
Don expressed his gratitude for the pallet of filters paid for by the Midland Club. He described them as large buckets filled almost to the top with sand and gravel and then topped with a biological layer that helps catch bacteria. Many (nearly 30,000)have been delivered, with the help of himself and many others, to Haiti, the Dominican Republic, Honduras and now Nigeria.
His team of two arrived in Lagos and were promptly sequestered in a secure motel as they were surrounded by over 13,000,000 people, some of whom might have presented a threat to two white men. At 5 am they were loaded into a vehicle for a 7.5 hr. drive over the worst roads he'd ever seen at a constant bone jarring speed of 150 km/hr as they hung on for their lives. They were welcomed, on their arrival, by the local Rotary Club which was opening its new building and inducting its new President.
He thoght he'd gone just to teach how to use these filters but his first day he was swarmed by officials from all over the country and they even had lunch with a local king. The filters are desperately needed as over 1,500 children die in the area every month from bad water. The poverty and pollution in the country are awful, the roads terrible and the government corrupt. They had difficulties getting the filters in at first. Everyone wants foreign currency because theirs is debased and heavily counterfeited so no one knows what they are getting.
But the people, he said, are wonderful and very welcoming and grateful for the help. He taught them how to put the filters together and how to install and care for them. Everybody who saw them work was very impressed. They are 99.9% effective and are needed because all open water is used for everything from laundry to latrines. These filters last a lifetime, don't need new sand or gravel and can be cleaned easily. Don will be going back in 6 months to inspect and his wife will go with him to teach basics of hygiene and bring them some soap, which is unobtainable there.
Don suggested that each one of us should try to get out on one of these work experiences. They are eye-opening. You need to be careful but the work is necessary, it's not that expensive and you feel you've done something.
Jamie Hunter expressed the Club's gratitude for Don's work and for bringing his experiences back to share with us.