Decompression

After I have had a few days to decompress from the trip (and my muscles have mostly recovered), I wanted to put a few thoughts out here.

The water system is a little complicated for operation. There is an initial flow rate to set up, then you have to adjust an alum level. After which, you have to adjust another flow rate and then adjust the chlorine level based on results from putting a test strip in the outflow of water. Once you have those set, the filter can run on its own until it is empty of alum (which will happen first) and then chlorine. The alum looked like it would last for roughly 10,000 liters of drinking water and the chlorine would last for more than double that before you would have to refill either one of them.

Then there is the matter of back flushing which has to be done daily - it appeared - because the water going in was pretty dirty with silt. If a better silt pond were built you could back flush the filters less frequently (we did build one using rocks in the river, but with the limited resources the one we built will not do much good).

There was one gentleman from the church who seemed to be really paying attention and so we took him in as the local expert and operator. There was another guy there that we trained as backup. My personal concern is two-fold: 1) that the two guys that we trained in will not recall the details of what to do and how to run it (or troubleshoot it) and 2) that after the supply of alum and chlorine run out, it will just sit there.

That I know of, no one was told where to get alum or chlorine after the supply is used up in 6 months. That combined with the cost of obtaining those two things and the diesel fuel for the generator makes me wonder how long it will be in operation there. I have a few questions to ask of the Samaritan's Purse leader to find out how that will all work, but I wouldn't mind making occasional trips to there to make sure that it is working for the community.

I fear that once the supplies are used up, that the people in the town will revert back to the way they did things before the filter got there. The church that we worked with in Bassin Bleu was not one of ours. We (the Baptist Haiti Mission) wanted it to be closer to one of our churches so we could manage the maintenance and future needs of it, but Samaritan's Purse had reasons to go to Bassin Bleu including a greater need there.

I really feel strongly about not letting the supplies get used up and no one purchases new ones. The filter system will sit there unused while people drink, and get sick from, the river water. It would be a large waste of donated money, supplies, and labor. The filter would get used for someone's personal money-making business or broken apart for parts... I just don't want to see that happen.

We'll see how this will all play out in the next couple days and weeks.

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The people really appreciated the water. They were gathering around waiting patiently. The one thing that surprised me is that in the States, people would generally form a line. That doesn't seem to happen here whether it is at the water filter or the airport. People just get as close as they can forming a large mob with no order as to who was first or last. I think it is this type of disorder that leads to arguments and chaos. Fortunately that didn't happen.

The Samaritan's Purse leader did a great job trying to include the pastor(s) as the primary coordinator and then the mayor as secondary so the whole community was involved and aware not just the church members. They gathered people who brought five gallon pails and various other containers.

It was so nice to be a part of this blessing to people in need. The money for the filter came through the Samaritan's Purse organization. (correction...I found out that the filter was donated by WMI and they worked with Samaritan's Purse to get it implemented). I want to figure out a way to make sure they have funds to continue to run the filter if that is something that we (the Baptist Haiti Mission) end up doing or if the community/church will do it.

I may have more decompression later...