I write this blog from the front of an open air church at approximately 1500m altitude in the foothills of the Rwenzori mountains. The Rwenzoris apparently have some of the highest peaks in Africa, and unlike Kilimanjaro or Mt. Kenya, are a range instead of solitary volcanic peaks. I’ll have to check my guidebook, but I believe they go as high as 5,000 metres, and there are glaciers up there, which is impressive as they lie within 50km of the equator.

When I was last able to update, I’d just arrived in Kasese. On Friday morning, we met up with Yona, the diocene engineer, and headed off to investigate a source in the northern part of Kasese district, just north of the Kitswamba parish (the Ugandan geographical political order goes District, county, sub-county, parish and village). Unknown to us, the source had already been tapped 20 years earlier and a long pipeline with approximately 90 taps had already been installed. However, only 20 of the taps currently worked, and the system was losing a significant amount of water due to leakage. So it appeared that they were wondering if we could fix the pipeline rather than install a new one. Unfortunately, from our understanding of CIDA grants, this would likely not fly as CIDA is looking for sustainability in it’s project, and repairing a pipeline implies it wasn’t maintained/sustained very well in the first place.

Plus the coliform counts from the water sample came back high.

On Saturday we headed off to the southwest of the Kasese district and investigated approximately 5 sources over a 6 km route(on foot of course). As this was still in the foothills, the terrain was pretty heinous. Evaluated all five sources and together they might supply water for 2,000 – 3,000 people, but the need is to supply 10,000. It seems that the majority of the people in the area have to complete a daily 5km walk to get water. And of course the test results came back indicating all five sources were contaminated with bacteria. So it was another exhausting (physically and emotionally) day.

As we were staying in the bishop’s guest house, we were invited to church service on sunday. I declined and instead choose to visit some chimps at the Kyambura gorge. The gorge descends from the Rift valley plains in QENP into a tropical riverine forest. Dense tall trees, baboons and colobus monkeys everywhere. We also came across quite a few hippos, which explained the AK47 the guide was casually carrying along. The guide had promised a 2-2.5 walk, but after 3.5hrs we still hadn’t heard a thing, and so turned back disappointed. Just as we were heading out of the gorge, we heard that distinctive chimp hoot/scream. Turned back and found the chimps! So cool. Much larger than I was expecting and able to get up really close. Currently top of my list for wildlife sightings. I’m currently banking on the tree-climbing lions of Ishasha plains to top that.

Monday met with the district water board and found out they have a few plans for GFSs, but none that we could look at that moment, and none that we could use. But we could get the plans for the currently installed ones in the areas we’re interested in...but we’ll have to come back on Friday.

Yesterday headed back out to the northern area of the Kasese district and visited the Kaswa parish. The chairman of the parish (known as local chairman II or LCII for short), had mapped out four sources, and a rough sketch of a GFS that he was hoping to get funding for. This map included all of the villages, trading centres (larger villages where, you guessed it, people trade) and other crucial information Wes and I keep attempting to get. Most importantly he showed us two sources that had a relatively good yield, and test results today showed were relatively clean. The yield would only support about 4,500 people, but thankfully the parish only has 3,500. So we might just have a project we can finally write up. Or at least half of one. It’s something, and for the past three weeks, we feel like we’ve gotten nowhere, so it was important.

Spent today assessing four other sources in another parish, of which only two had sufficient flow to bother looking at, and even then were rather pathetic. So that brought us back down to earth after the half triumph of yesterday. Still, we seem to be getting somewhere, it just may take far more time than we have to get there.

As I write this (still in the church), I’m surrounded by thirteen kids who are all fascinated by a computer. It’s kind of eerie because they’re all within four feet of me, and they just stare at me or the computer in complete silence. Personal space has a different meaning up here. This place has no electricity, no running water (we’re working on that part), and of course no tv. So we seem to be the most interesting thing happening.

Going back to Kaswa tomorrow to see if we can develop this half proposal into a full one by finding more sources. But the more we search the more it seems that perhaps we may have to change our overall approach. All of the big sources seem to have been found and tapped. Trying to combine the smaller sources may add up in numbers, but reduces the efficiency of the system, and in the end, may still not be enough. Which has me pondering another philosophical question. If we manage to turn this into a water project, and likely raise the standard of living for the population served, the population will likely grow to the point where the water is not enough far faster than we designed for. Which seems to me Uganda will have this same problem of not enough safe water in less than 10 years. And at that point, the solution will certainly not be solvable by natural springs because they’ll all be used which would mean more expensive pumping or treatment systems. But that’s a problem for ten years from now and perhaps technology will solve that problem. Right now I’m just trying to find some water.