Texting water to Enkito

"Farmers are struggling after one of the hottest and driest months recorded have left entire crops parched and failed".

This is NORTH YORKSHIRE, near Wetherby.

Thousands of miles away in Enkito, Amboseli, SW Kenya, the ground is always parched. When the rains finally do arrive the ground soaks up as much as it can and then surface water washes away most of the remaining fertile topsoil, leaving only rock and sand. But its been like this for hundreds of years. The maasai have learnt to cope - but not to the extent that global warming has now reduced even the glacial cover on Kilimanjaro. Since 2000, the plateau's three remaining ice fields have shrunk by 26 percent. Scientists found that both the Northern and Southern ice fields atop Kilimanjaro have thinned dramatically in recent years, while the smaller Furtwangler Glacier shrank as much as 50 percent between 2000 and 2009. These glaciers feed the only rivers in the area, rivers that are running dry.

This is Ulla. She died recently after 2009's most severe drought yet in the area.

The maasai community of Enkito is one we are personally involved with. Volunteer interaction with the group have found that there is a tap outside the village which works for one day a week, flitering a private supply of water, which must be paid for but it is sporadic, unreliable and spared among many other communities.  The women tend to walk the long distance to the river to ensure adequate water is maintained in the community. Having a well similar to one recently put in at the Mercy Home in Maseno will ease the lives of these women and the community greatly and ensure that their reliance on the river itself does not cause hardship in years to come.

Recently Justgiving has started a FREE TextGiving service and we'd like to ask you to help us bring water to this community, by simply texting ENKI20 £xx (where xx is the amount you wish to give) to 70070; a donation allowing us to sink a borehole well which the community will own and maintain. Full training will be given alongside the communities involvement in drilling.

Anything you can give will help. "Ashi oleng"

Maasai at TED (almost)

Petr, one of our Czech volunteers from the Summer has managed to upload hundreds of his photos to both Flickr and Facebook to pass on just how amazing the month was he spent at the village of Enkito, Amboseli National Park, alongside fellow volunteers, Shiv and Emma.
This is one of Petr's photos of Narakiramart looking at this actual photo! She's smiling now but was actually scared of the camera.

I also just heard from Ben Rigby of The Extraordinaries aka micro-volunteering at Sparked.Com who's been talking to the world via a stage at TED about how he's helping us get help to put in a well for the village to ease Narakiramart's chores (and the other women) of walking up to 8 KILOMETRES to fetch water.
This whole project started after a simple conversation with Maasai's modern man, Jackson, pictured below ( thanks to Emma for the photo).

I met Jackson while at the fabulous eco-camp; Stilts, in Diani Beach on the Indian Coast, this April. He and a few other village members moonlight as askari (warrior) nightwatchmen there as part of an exclusive friendly contract written years back with the owner. Although we have fabulous photos of Jackson turning up with a Cosmopolitan under his arm he is still extremely proud of his heritage, village and traditions, working in Diani simply to earn more for his community.
I'd literally just walked down off Mount Kenya that morning and had bags and bags of dirty wet clothes. I was stood washing my ridiculously large amount of clothing chatting to Jackson who dresses simply in the traditional shuka, flipflops made from old tyres and shorts! They do make up for it with jewellery though and Jackson does a roaring trade with the visitors, taking orders to make bespoke jewellery and texting these orders to the women in the community.

I felt fairly ridiculous washing my 4th pair of trousers in the sink while chatting with him but this was when he told me how far the women have to walk for water. They have donkeys to help and having our volunteers spend a month with Jackson and the community this summer, we  know there is a communal tap just outside that works every Tuesday !!!!!
So .. if you can help us help these fabulous people and their amazing children then please get in touch. They'd love to welcome you into their village for a visit under the watchful eye of Kilimanjaro, otherwise, simply click here to help us help them. Asante sana!

Another summer over .. unless you want to go to Kenya NOW??

The volunteers have sadly all left their communities now though both the villagers and the volunteers will have no doubt left huge impressions on each. Its never an easy time, especially for the children, to say Goodbye, but the great thing is memories, experiences learnt and of course THE PHOTOS .......
Emma's fabulous album from Amboseli is here on FaceBook and I'll pass on more as they get uploaded.
Enjoy ...


..and from Nakuru (more on the LLK website).

Bringing water to Enkito's children

I've been chatting with Jeff of Staff of Hope, the Raleigh, NC funded drill team in Kenya.

Jeff is currently in Oloitoktok deep in true one-road country to the right of Amboseli National Park and about 90km east of Enkito.

In the next week the hydrogeological survey and environmental studies will be completed to determine how deep to drill the well for the village. We are busy fundraising for this drilling so please pass this video on and help where you can, donating to the website [top left].

Our volunteers; Emma, Shiv and Petr are busy helping with the community and teaching maths, social siences, environment studies and helping with English. Currently the children have to go home to eat during the break and it takes up a lot of time. Most schools can apply for funding for school meals and we need to assist the community in this but after February's severe drought killed so many of the maasai's vital cattle, they had to let go their 2nd teacher.

The women of the village are currently walking almost 8 km from the village to the nearest water point to get drinking water and there is no water available for the children when they are in school so please help us bring water to Enkito.

Sinking a borehole in Amboseli

Preparations are underway and folks are getting excited about this years Summer Programme of volunteering. 3 young ladies from UK will be spending a month with the Maasai Askari Enkito village in Amboseli.
There was "a relocation, in February 2010, of 7,000 wilderbeest and zebras by the Kenyan wildlife Service to Amboseli National Park, famed for the spectacular views of Mt Kilimanjaro and the elephant population....

Last year, the drought left millions hungry, killed livestock, evaporated lakes and streams and .... Amboseli was severely affected ... 60% of the zebra and wildebeest population died, severely compromising the ecological balance of the park and its surrounding areas....In addition, the drought took 50% to 80% of the Maasai cattle herds. Predators lost their prey base and lions, already critically endangered in Kenya, also faced starvation, so they turned to killing the few remaining cattle and other Maasai livestock...

The initiative will ensure the preservation of the ecosystem in the Amboseli. .." [link to article]

To help the village to avoid these problems and other water conflicts we'd like to help by sinking a well in the village. Quotes are coming in at anywhere from $100 - $4000 but I'm sure with the maasai labour we can hire the equipment and expertise to do this for much cheaper. We're also getting "Extraordinary" help from a source I can't reveal .. yet! .. a fantastic new service to non-profits we're working with.
If you know anyone who can help during August, or wants to sponsor this project, or knows a company that would like to offer support, please let us know.


Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

A new host maasai community in Amboseli

While in Diani on the Indian Ocean coast we stayed at Stilts Backpackers.
View Larger Map One of the night watchmen there is a Maasai called Jackson. He works at Stilts and travels home as often as possible to help provide for his family. While i washed our ridiculous amount of clothing, after arriving from climbing Mt Kenya, we spoke for some time about his village in Amboseli National Park and how Cecilie (a Norwegian friend also staying at Stilts) had visited there. For "muzungu" Jackson's village is a paradise. Life there is very different and very simple, in fact its an entire education and we'd like to offer that experience to our AVIF volunteers.

If you'd like to experience Amboseli and stay with Jackson's community, perhaps help them to improve their water supply and basic education for their children, then please get in touch.
[Jackson 2nd left]


Asante sana Cecilie for these photos.