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We are beyondour first two weeks and staring down our last two. It’s been amazing howquickly energy and time seem to be whisked off with ever-present beads ofsweat. Our water filter project has been a vacuum for our attention anddeservedly so. Very early on, our environment here asked that we make ensureany filters distributed be tested against the especially turbid lake water,resemble something that could one day be economically viable with EDGE out ofthe picture. Much of our focus before coming was on how to make a workingfilter after getting here, as well as getting things, like the shipment ofceramic from Kenya, safely on the island. For example the container for thekegs has been a massive hang up. We require a relatively large container that alsoneeds to be around 15,000 UGS, or $6. We’ve come close and may have a suitablesolution, but it remains imperfect. We also were unable to do even presenceabsence tests for E. coli. until Joanna, a pioneer of the keg design broughther black light. Without this, we had no grounds to say that the filters wereeffective against the water pulled from the lake. Encouragingly, we found no E.coli. in samples taken from just using the ceramic element as it is designed.Come Tuesday, we will test a round of kegs, to test for and enumerate the E.coli. If all goes well, the kegs will be proven effective, though we still needto evaluate whether this design could stick long term in the islands. The worstcase scenario, worst, would be toabandon the keg design and use the ceramic filters as pots. This would behumbling, though would double the amount of filters we can get out there.
Our otherprojects have been pushing along. We are trying to foster to girls’ soccerteams. We installed a pedal powered pump in the school garden. We’re preparingan “urban gardening” workshop. We will be filling in a few gaps at the primaryschool where they recently lost three teachers. And MORE.
Last night wewere inspired to do a first-aid workshop at the secondary school throughterrible circumstances. During an intense football game, a student had his headknocked on another player and proceeded to lose consciousness. In the absenceof any nurses on the island, EDGE took control of the situation, as he remainedonly barely responsive for thirty minutes. In a show of our best teamwork yet,we dressed a head wound, monitored his vitals, checked for responsiveness, andultimately secured him to a board with full precautions as he was brought byboat to Jinja and driven to Kampala. The group was basically thefirst-responders for three-hours unconscious hours, then Kristin and Claudiawent on to channel their futures in medicine by helping all through the nightas he was moved to Kampala. Almost 24 hours after the incident, they havereturned. The student seems to have suffered a very, very severe concussion.Frustratingly, he remained unconscious for the over six hours it took to get him to a proper hospital. After theincident, we became aware of the astounding gap in medical knowledge between anAmerican high schooler and their Ugandan counter-part. In the coming weeks, wewill do a workshop to share those things like, apply pressure and elevate aftera cut, that seem common knowledge, but are unknown here.
I’ve beenpersonally awful at getting our blogmill up and running, though the volunteerqueue has been short. I hope we can ramp it up in our remaining time. Keepwriting to us!
Paulo