The Beauty of Development in Action

It's hard to take in how different my life is from those in rural Kenya and Rwanda. I've just returned from my first visit there and am trying to come to grips with the truths that I saw.  I saw intense material poverty alongside abundant spiritual life, intense material poverty alongside deeply impoverished spiritual life, acceptance of what is with gratitude for the basics of life however limited in quantity, and deep social problems and related medical tragedies---and on and on.

When faced with the astronomical numbers of people living without clean water and living with AIDS, it is easy to ask yourself "How in the world can I possibly help?" Mostly, it's hard, but in small ways we can make a BIG difference. What Blood:Water Mission has learned to do so well, is making a HUGE impact. We come alongside viable, earnest, and outstanding partners whose local presence is trusted. We enter into plans that are created by the people who will most benefit--the people living day by day in the community. Through those plans we earn their trust, too, as a partner in development. I saw this played out in Lwala, Kenya especially, a community where Blood:Water is heavily invested. 

Kelly Baird, a Lwala Community Alliance Coordinator, helps area schools and community groups gather and plan for what they see as most needed. They conduct strategic planning sessions and draw up detailed plans with goals and objectives. Spreadsheets are created for each project with actions, deadlines and point persons for each step. Funds are then designated as needed and from specific prospective sources (all of this being done in a very rural community, that just gained electricity in the past year). Everyone does their part, and at the end of the planning stage, the project is left in enthusiastic LOCAL hands.

Local partner Elizabeth is the instructor of the WASH Training (Water, Sanitation and Hygiene) in the Lwala Community. She delivers training that uses state of the art adult learning principles: establishing expectations for each class member, frequent opportunities to give feedback that shows what's working and what's not. Multiple educational tools are being used to teach WASH principles: audio (lecture), small group discussions with reporting, graphic arts, music, and drama are utilized. All without benefit of electricity or running water in our building (no PowerPoint presentation's here)!  Read Jena's blog entry which tells the specifics of what we learned.

Here I was in the deep rural regions of Kenya witnessing strategic planning and the execution of water and WASH plans which were top notch---suddenly, the large numbers of people living without clean water seemed so real---THIS is how we help. People are taking part in improving their own villages, family compounds, and schools. They are learning from their own people how to raise their own standards for living life. For some part of their plan we have the privilege of being alongside. 

 Blog post written by: Anne Cregger - Blood:Water Mission Board Member