Bernie Eckerle of Suttons Bay sat down with a tall glass of ice water and read a letter from her daughter, Stephanie, whom she hasn’t seen in nearly two years.

“You take for granted what we have here,” Eckerle said. “I don’t think twice about getting a drink of water. Let alone drinking it with ice.”

STEPHANIE ECKERLE a St. Mary graduate – is shown while traveling in a cart with two villagers.
Stephanie Eckerle, a 1999 graduate of Lake Leelanau St. Mary, has been in the African nation of Tanzania working as a Peace Corps volunteer. Much of her communication is written. There’s no electricity or running water as we know it in the village of Bassotughang.
“There is no safe and dependable drinking water,” her mother said.

Eckerle is doing what she can to change that, and she’s hoping for some support from Leelanau residents to help the cause.

Eckerle lives in the district of Hanang, a dry and arid region. Most of the water in the area begins at Mt. Hanang, which acts as a water catchment source. The water is then pumped through a system of pipes and tubing to neighboring village. The water that Bassotughang should receive (through the bomba system) is piped fives miles from the mountain to the neighboring village of Hidet, and from there, another two miles to Bassotughang. In the dry season when water is limited, villages closer to the source cut off the water supply before it can reach Bassotughang. That requires villagers needing water walk to Lake Bassotughang, a pool at the bottom of a volcanic crater. The water is neither clean nor safe. During the rainy season, all local runoff flows into the lake, contaminating the water.

“Villagers descend miles multiple times daily (to the lake) only to retrieve enough dirty water to cook and drink for one day,” Eckerle wrote to her mother, adding that in the past year alone four children have drowned after slipping on the steep slopes of a river. “These villagers choose not to bathe or wash clothes, unless they have extra time while at the lake … fetching water for these purposes is simply too feasible.”

To illustrate the point, Eckerle recounted a day-long excursion with two Swahili friends in which they traveled to the water source at Mount Hanang. The trio gathered many buckets and containers with a 3-gallon capacity and set out with a cart and four bulls at 11 a.m. They arrived at their destination, five miles away, at 1 p.m. and filled all of the containers.  But, on the way home a tire on the cart popped, forcing one of the three to return to Mt. Hanang and get a replacement.

ST. MARY SCHOOL students contribute to fund for a community well in a Tanzanian village where Stephanie Eckerle is working as a volunteer. Pictured are, from left, are fourth-grader Ryan Popp, fifth-grader Andrew Mikowski, sixth-grader Jack Garthe, and second-grader Shannon Popp
By the time they got returned to Bassotughang it was not only dark, but they were charged by a bull.
“It was pretty exhausting … So with all that, my tank is a quarter full,” wrote Ecklerle, who rations her water for drinking and cooking. “Bathing and washing clothes comes at the bottom of the list.”

She is working with an organization called Living Waters to establish a community well. The cost of the project is estimated at $28,000, and she’s trying to raise $10,000 toward the project. She’s organizing a raffle there to help raise funds, and her mother and father Tom donated money for her to buy a plow that gets pulled by oxen. She also ventured out into “the bush” to ask some farmers to donate one bull as a grand prize for the raffle. Other prizes include seeds and a goat. For their part, the villagers have to raise more than $2,500—“a ton of money for them,” Eckerle said.

She has reached out to St. Mary students and parishioners who organized a “loose change” collection yesterday at the school. Donations may also be sent to: Peace Corps, Office of Private Sector Initiatives, 1111 20th St. NW, Washington D.C. 20077-9400  (reference project # 621-179) or via the Internet at www.peacecorps.gov.