Peace of Mind for Vestine
When we went to visit Vestine, she was at home with her young daughter. Her husband was at work and her two young sons were visiting a friend. Vestine and her husband had moved to this rural village in 2014 from Kigali. She was surprised that most people in the area were using lake water for their needs. She told us that she also “started using this water, well aware that it is not healthy.”
As we asked about the filter, she recalled a time when her son was younger and he became very sick from dirty water. Her story was both familiar and frightening for any parent. Her son was vomiting and had severe diarrhea.
“It was my first time seeing those things come out of a person. I got really scared and asked the neighbor. They told me that it was the water causing it and we went to the hospital.”
Soon after that, volunteers came to Vestine’s home and told her that she was eligible for a filter. When she went to pick it up, they taught her how to clean and care for it. She tells that she is confident that she knows how to maintain her filter and knows how to contact program volunteers if she ever needs help.
She still collects water for her family from the lake or rain water, but now she passes that water through her filter before using it. Since receiving her filter, her three children have been healthy.
Vestine shares the filter with the her neighbors and tenants. They bring water to pass through the filter and come back later to collect the filtered water. The filter has improved her life and the lives of her neighbors.
More than that, access to clean water has the power to bring peace of mind to parents like Vestine. She tells us, “What the filter helped me most is to protect my children.”
