In the South-West of Sri Lanka, Malteser International helps fishermen's families to live a life with dignity
Mirissa is a romantic little village on the coast in the south-west of Sri Lanka, a diver's paradise where tourists who dare to visit the warn-torn country can discover beautiful coral reefs, colourful fish and enormous ocean turtles. But Mirissa also has another face. Only a few hundred meters away from the coast line one finds houses built on a precipitous hillside. In the rainy season the paths that have been provisionally built into the earthy hill transform into glossy, slippery slops, numerous houses cannot be reached for days or even weeks because of the danger of landslides. Neither electricity nor running water is available in this part of Mirissa. Those who wanted to have drinking water not so long ago had to climb downwards the narrow and steep way to the public water supply and go back the same way heavily loaded with the water cans. Fortunately, this burden was eased recently when Malteser International together with the inhabitants and the Sri Lankan organisation "Lanka Rain Water Harvesting Forum" built rain water harvesting tanks directly next to the houses. "Since we have the tank, I have much more time to care for my children and the household", says Kaushaliya. The mother of three children in former times had to climb up and down the hill up to five or six times a day to get enough water for the family. "That was extremely hard, especially when I was pregnant and when I had to take the baby with me because I did not want to leave him all alone", she remembers. "And my neighbour is 73 years old. She also had to climb up and down several times per day. Most of the time she had to go even more often then I did because she could not carry as much water as I could. And she needed water not only for herself but also for her grandchildren."
Now, Kaushaliya and her neighbours have one problem less. "When it rains, I only have to open the stopper on the rain pipe. After a few minutes, when the rain has washed all the dirt from the roof and no more mud is flowing through the pipes and tubes, I also open the portal to the water tank. Then, the water from the roof runs through a filter into the tank and we have a huge reservoir of clean and safe drinking water." Once a year, the families have to clean the tank thoroughly to ensure that the water will not be contaminated within the tank during the dry season. "The craftsmen who built the tanks have shown us exactly how to do the cleaning, that's very easy."
To assure that the water will stay clean not only in the tank but also after the families have siphoned it off, volunteer health workers of Malteser International come to visit the families who received a tank and explain them all important details on hygiene. Thus, Kaushaliya and her neighbours learn for example, that clean buckets and bottles must be used to collect the water from the tank and how washing their hands with water and soap can reduce the risk of dissemination of infectious diseases. The 19 volunteers who come from neighbouring villages and who are between 20 and 52 years old have been trained in health and hygiene education by Malteser International. They visit the inhabitants of remote villages and settlements and show them how they can clean contaminated water by cooking it or with the help of the ultraviolet rays of the sun and many other important subjects related to health and hygiene. They know why the risk of malaria is extremely high in their region (during the rainy season, the mosquitoes transferring the disease find ideal breeding conditions in water ponds and puddles) and how the families can protect themselves against it. They also can explain what to do when someone - in spite of all precautions - suffers from diarrhoea and which kind of hygiene measures are especially important for babies and young children.
For all those who cannot read, the volunteer
health workers wear the most important messages as a comic on the back of their shirts. "Especially my children learnt a lot from them", Kaushaliya says. But also the young mother profited greatly from the regular visits of the Malteser International team. "I knew the two young ladies who came here as health volunteers as we grew up in the same village. That's why I trust them and believe in the things they teach us. If they say that it is better to wash or to peel the vegetables before we eat them to avoid germs, I am sure that it is a good advice and I follow it", she explains. "The same is true when they say we should wash our hands when we have used the toilets. Before they came, I did not know that this was important and healthy. But the volunteers know all about it. But that's normal as they followed a training of Malteser International and those people are really renowned for being experts in health in this region."
Lasantha Herath smiles happily when he hears such compliments. He is the project manager of the water tank project in this region. "Our volunteer health workers visit the families on a regular basis and check whether they stick to the hygiene advice and answer the questions of the families." Without the volunteers the project would not be as successful as it is now, Lasantha Herath points out. The organisation gives them a bike in order to allow them to reach remote areas more quickly, trains them regularly and pays a small allowance. "But the best thing with the volunteers is that they will continue to transmit their knowledge even after the end of our project", says the project manager. "This ensures the sustainability of the project and gives a long lasting effect to all the material improvements we have made." Another important aspect for Lasantha Herath is to help the inhabitants of the whole tsunami affected region, not only the people living directly on the coast. "The families living on this hillside here in Mirissa were not directly affected by the tsunami, they didn't loose their houses", the Sri Lankan health expert explains. "But as most of the men have been working as fishermen, they lost their boats and could no longer earn money. Thus, the families who have been extremely poor even before the disastrous wave where even poorer after the tsunami."
But with the tanks and the new knowledge about health and hygiene issues, the families in this poor neighbourhood can now live a life with more dignity. "We have safe drinking water and my family only rarely gets sick", Kaushaliya smiles. "And maybe I can spend the time that I had to invest to collect water in former times, in order to earn some more money and to improve our lives."
Esther Finis
[ Any views expressed in this article are those of the writer and not of Reuters. ]
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