At 2:17, JUNE 11th, 2008, the Meshenani Borehole was born.

Dear friends, you have to know what went into this to appreciate what came out. So do the urgent things, clear your desk, then take a few minutes to read our story.

We started out drilling at Meshenani on Thursday, June 5 th , with high expectations. The community all came out to the site to watch, pray, provide tea and meat, be on hand for everything. On the second day we expected we’d reach water bearing layers and invited the school children to come and watch. We bought sodas and sweets for the celebration. The school kids prepared songs to sing and signs to hold “Water is life – for people and animals”, “God Bless Joyce and Water is Life”. They waited patiently under the big acacia tree, occasionally getting up and roaring around, eventually getting used to the NOISE made by the drilling machine.

By the end of the day we’d reached 160 meters with no water and so we pushed our celebration plans to the next day. The drilling was going slowly. We were drilling through hard rock. The next morning we encountered more of the same – hard, homogenous rock. Mr. Mugucia, the man from the ministry of water, said, “Joyce this doesn’t look good because this layer just goes on and on, but let’s go to 200 meters and see if we get a change.” We went to 198 m – still the big white clouds of pulverized stone flying up into the air. The community gathered around the drill to pray fervently as the last drilling rod went into the ground. “Please give us something, God,” we all prayed. Then the ladies invited me to sit with them in the grove of trees where they were cooking, while we waited. We watched the white cloud. Nothing changed. We all knew. No water. I looked at the teary eyes and long faces. They gave me cup after cup of tea to console me, keeping the thermos at my feet, somebody watching if my cup was empty and then adding more when it got low. I knew it was a critical moment. They were all watching me to see how I would react, what I would do.

I sat there sipping, praying to keep my composure, to know what to do. I knew we couldn’t give up. We’d go to plan B. What plan B? We had been sure we were going to get water! My team members and I sat down with Mr. Mugucia and we planned. We got on the phone (thank God for cell phones) arranged for the survey team to come do another survey, got 2 days of grace from the drilling company to keep the machine on site while we determined if there was another good drilling site, and decided that we should celebrate anyway – because we were together, alive, and everybody did a great job. So we gathered everyone together, told them we weren’t giving up, reminded ourselves “God is here with us”, outlined our Plan B and got on with the party!

The next day, Sunday, we set off early morning with the geologists who had responded quickly to our plea for help, and arrived the night before from Kajiado. The new team examined the report of the other geologist who had recommended the original site, visited the site of the dry borehole. We did several soundings around the site of the salty, abandoned borehole, and planned to visit another site recommended by the other geologist. On the way to the second site, we passed an area where a dam had been built to take advantage of the runoff from the seasonal rains, where there were also several large tortillis acacia trees. Since these trees indicate good, long term underground water sources, we decided to stop and survey there. The 2 soundings we did there gave signs that there were several water-bearing strata. The geologist was confident that this was the best choice of the 3 sites we had at this point. This site would have good recharge from any seasonal rains and was farther from the salty environment of the lake bed. We marked it off and called the drillers to move their rig to the site to start drilling in the morning.

The bosses of the drilling company met with us that evening to debrief, renegotiate and move forward. We are lucky because they are good guys, hardworking, good-humored and want us to be happy and get water. You don’t always find this type of person in business in Kenya . They were even kind enough to give me a ride all the way to Kitengela so I could sleep in my bed, get clean clothes and do the necessary to pay for phase 2 of Meshenani.

The next day I traveled back to the site with the vehicle from the drilling company carrying diesel to the rig. To avoid the worst section of terrible, rocky, corrugated road that connects Namanga to Amboseli National Park , I led the driver the back way, through the villages of the scattered community of Olgulului on the dusty roads, past giraffes and gazelles, and migrating cattle. The driver said, “there’s no way I can find this way back on my own”. Sometimes I can’t believe I know my way around these parts, but this is almost home territory now!

We arrived in the afternoon to find the work going nicely. They were drilling through varied layers, some moist and sandy, some fractured rocks and around 50 meters some water, very salty, but water, nonetheless. According to Mr. Mugucia, these were promising signs. Tuesday gave us a little more water in the 80 meter range, then the drilling continued until the rock particles mixed with the moist sandy soils created a sort of cement that clogged the drill bit and the drilling rods. Before we could continue, the drillers had to pull all the pipes out of the ground and clean it out. They hoped that cleaning it out would free the hole from clogging materials, and, if more water was there, it could find a way out. But honestly, the yield was still small. At the close of work on Tuesday, the driller and Mr. Mugucia didn’t want to say it plain, but I could tell they both were losing hope.

From the start of our work in Meshenani, I had been giving reports of the day to my parents, sister, friends in Kenya , but on Tuesday night I didn’t want to talk on the phone to anyone, as if speaking a word of uncertainty would tip the balance toward another failure. I was trying to stay positive, but feeling despair at the door. How would I explain 2 dry boreholes? It’s not like buying a pair of shoes that don’t fit. A borehole is expensive, permanent, non-refundable, and when dry, useless.

In the quiet of that long night, I didn’t bargain with God. I reminded myself of the fact that He brought us so far, not to have us fail, but to get water for the people of Meshenani. They need it so badly and God promises to provide for us, like he provides the birds of the air, which don’t ever worry about anything. Plus, I knew how many people were praying for our success: my parents, my friends, church communities I’ve belonged to or visited, all you, you generous, faithful people who have supported this, the prayers of the whole community of Meshenani, the people from the first borehole in Imisigyio who knew we had to cancel a visit there to continue drilling a second site at Meshenani, and my friend James, who is paralyzed from the waist down, and can’t participate in many activities, but always wants the news when we pass through his village, who led his church on Sunday in a half hour of prayer for us.

On Wednesday, after the morning’s drilling, we stopped at 180 meters. Mr. Mugucia, the expert from the Ministry of Water who was supervising the work, had suggested we stop there since the geological survey indicated the end of the promising zone. The drilling boss, Jayeu and Mugucia pulled me aside to say they didn’t think there was enough water. Meanwhile, community members kept asking me, “isn’t it a lot of water?” I answered, “we don’t really know until we clean the hole, how much is there,” but feeling, especially remembering the volume of water at the borehole at Imisigyio, that it wasn’t enough at all. We broke for lunch, the drillers turned off the machine. I went off to eat, preparing myself for a meeting with the community to explain that the borehole yielded too little water to be worth installing the permanent casing (pipes) in.

I returned to the site after lunch to find the machine on again, not for cleaning the hole, as discussed, but to continue drilling! Mugucia explained that he had called the geologist who had done the sounding, who recommended continuing to drill to 200 – something was indicated by the soundings at that depth that could be water.

At 184 meters at 2:17 on Wednesday, June 11, water started pouring out of the hole. Not trickling, dribbling, oozing, but GUSHING, splashing all over everyone in proximity.

Joy. Relief. Gratitude. The end of hands on hips and furrowed brows. The community, the drillers’ team, I, Mr. Mugucia. We all knew. Finally. This was WATER. Enough water.

The men started digging a trench to divert the water to the dam nearby so livestock could come and drink. People came from all corners of the community to see. The celebration could go ahead this time. That evening as we sat together with the community to plan the next day’s celebration the feeling was exhausted joy.

Let’s talk about what this all means for the community. The location of the new borehole is ideal. It is close to the primary school, close to the dam, close to the road going into the park, close to the villages and the development area, and far away from the livestock grazing banks. That’s all great news. It’s close to where people are so the water won’t need to be moved far at a high cost to serve the people. It’s located in a good drainage area so the possibilities of recharge are good when the rains come. It’s as if God was saying with this site, “You people, not way over there…get closer to the people!”

This is the first stage, of course, but the vital one. We know now we have something to work with. The question now is exactly what kind of water and how much is there. The 24-hour test pumping this weekend will measure water volume and quality. Because of the geology of the area, there is salt in the water. We hope that after continuous pumping the salt level will reduce as the deposits are flushed out. This has been the trend at other boreholes. At this point the water is palatable to livestock, and that is a huge asset to this community, who take their animals into the swamp in the park to get water. That water is stagnant, full of liver flukes and other parasites, the combination of these nasties and the long walk seriously weaken livestock. Not to mention the human/livestock/wildlife interaction that can be dangerous to people and livestock, if you contact an unruly buffalo, or disturb elephants.

By having to drill twice, of we course we incurred a much higher cost for drilling than we expected. Instead of 1.26 million shillings ($20,000), it cost 2 million ($30,000). We can certainly use your contributions now, more than ever, so we can do the next stages – like purchasing the pump and generator without delay so that the well can be functioning as soon as possible. The drought is severe here since the seasonal rains were meager, and people have already started moving their livestock to other areas.

Visit the website www.kenyawaterislife.com

As I close this letter, let me say I hope each of you are doing well. I pray for blessings, health and happiness for each of you. I’d love to hear something…a joke, a word, a New York summer fun anecdote… from you! There were some weddings, babies and other fantastic life events going–ons, I know! How ‘bout some photos, guys?

Much love,

Joyce

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