The Chidzekwe Girls

The four girls, dressed smartly in their school uniforms, were chatting gaily as they strolled homeward, carefully trying to keep the red dust off their newly shined shoes. While perhaps in the West they would each be holding the ubiquitous mobile phone in hand, these girls were carrying something much more valuable. Each had a 20 litre bucket of water perfectly balanced on their heads, but even this didn’t hinder their laughing chatter. 

They were clearly keen to join their friends at the little school at Chidzekwe, but needed to complete their morning chores, including fetching water. This has always been the job of the youngest girls, and so they quickly grow up with perfect upright posture and graceful slow movements which ensures not a drop is lost from the precious load. I’ve tried this once and, to everyone’s amusement, ended up soaking wet and red faced!

What has changed in the village, however, is that the girls now only have to walk a few hundred metres to the new tap and fill with clean cool water under the tree, rather than the few kilometres to the dirty stream. It has allowed them to get to school earlier, and be healthier, which clearly shone through their cheery faces.

We visited the site with Bishop Osiward and others, travelling the dust roads around 20km out from Masvingo. The fields and veld either side were dry and parched, baked by the relentless hot sun and lack of rain since April. Desiccated remains at cropping were in evidence where villagers had been attempting to scrape a living.

The new borehole was drilled by Rockwell, funded again by Tzaba, in May this year, and equipped with solar power in June. Tanks and distribution pipes were installed by Forster Irrigation, including a number of tap stands for the vegetable gardens and the community. The change has been remarkable.

The gardens are already equipped with drip irrigation pipelines and the potatoes, tomatoes and other vegetables are green and thriving. There is a sense of growth and life in the area. We were shown the piggeries, already with snorting inhabitants, and the chicken runs. The intention is that this site is to be the Training Centre for the Masvingo Diocese, bringing good farming and animal husbandry practices to the communities. The provision of the borehole has opened up so many new opportunities.

The borehole has been well managed, now enclosed impressively in a secure cage to keep animals and potential vandalism away. The fields are fenced and the pipes are neatly laid out. There was an issue with a cracked concrete apron, clearly poorly mixed cement. But the oddest incident was to discover that the community themselves had placed a lock on one of the taps, seemingly to control the usage of water. And when we asked for this to be removed, the key couldn’t open the lock!

I would imagine that living with scarcity instills a need to carefully manage and control the commodity. While I lectured them on the need to have this water freely available to all, perhaps I failed to appreciate their value of clean water to the community. It is obviously such a precious resource that there is an instinct to lock it up to prevent misuse…I have much to learn.

We can celebrate however, that the borehole, again, is prolific. Apparently the 3 large 5,000 litre tanks are filled by 10 am with full sunshine, and never fails to supply all that the community needs. Even the school across the road, which has failed boreholes, now collects their water from the new taps. 

Perhaps the real celebration is seen in the faces of the giggling school girls, carrying their precious daily water homeward. Life has changed for them. It is a benefit that cannot be easily measured, except in the smile on their faces.

Leonardo Boff said: The eternal destiny of human beings will be measured by how much or how little solidarity and compassion we have displayed with the hungry, the thirsty, the naked and the oppressed. In the end we will be judged in terms of how much we have loved.

I think this is pretty much requoting the words of Jesus.

Today we visit sites in and around Bulawayo before travelling out towards the

 Victoria Falls and Hwange tomorrow. Everyone is warning us about the terrible state of the road there, but we are allowing 9 hours of driving, and will try to leave by 5am to miss the trucks and buses, but I reckon our Guardian Angel is going to be super busy!

Thank you for reading, and to all our supporters who have contributed towards these projects.

Sandy