Friendly Water For The World

As I was unpacking and packing between returning from Jordan and leaving for India, my father sent a small package of which two items were to be delivered to two specific men working at the LAFTI headquarters. The second morning I was in Kuthur, I opened the package that David so insisted I pack which contained, along with a few other things such as sunflower seeds and the strongest bug repellant known to exist (I shall explain later), two white t-shirts with some blue picture and slogan on the front. “Friendly Water For The World” is what was written on the shirt be exact, with a drawing of the globe and a person using a water filter, the picture in its entirety designed by a nine-year-old homeschooled girl in the states.

To move along with the story, these two shirts were intended for the two men managing the biosand water filter project at LAFTI. Originally designed by an inventor at the Univeristy of Calgary in Canada, and brought to India by our Quaker friends Del and Sue Livingston out of Tacoma, WA, these filters that can remove up to 99% of bacteria and viruses from water are virtual genius. Using as mentioned in the title, a biosand layer that sits at the top of sand and gravel inside a cement molded three-foot rectangle with a small white tube coming out of the front, these filters are now being distributed in several different countries around the globe. Dell and his wife are part of a new non-profit organization Friendly Water For The World chaired by my father, and travel several times a year to Kenya and Burundi in Central Africa to distribute and train people to make and use these filters. They are made originally in a blue metal mold that can be taken and used to make a million more (one per day) using a little cement and water. I hate to make the whole thing sound so simple, but it really is just that simple. With dysentery as a common cause of death (especially among children) in the area where LAFTI is located, and occasional cholera outbreaks and epidemics in the state of Tamil Nadu where LAFTI does the majority of its work, these low cost, minimal resource-using biosand water filters ultimately act as life savers.


These two men I later presented the t-shirts to are in charge of making sure the numerous water filters sitting at the LAFTI head quarters are being distributed as needed. It is not that they are being given to every woman in every village, although that would be nice, but that every project location (every office, every hostel, and every gathering space) is equipped with at least one of these filters for that particular community’s use. And when the new homes LAFTI is building are completed, each will have a biosand filter. After presenting the two men with their t-shirts and asking them to pour a few cups of water using the filter, we all opened the filter to find a large population of ants and other insects that were keeping it from running smoothly. Although I understood that not all the people at the office where using this particular filter on a regular basis, the people who do use it every now and again were unaware of the filter’s needed upkeep. Even if one is not using the filter regularly, the filter must be fed a bucket of water every day or two in order to keep the biosand layer strong. When I asked why the workers were not using the filter more often, they said that during the rainy season or when there are a few rainy evenings in a row, they collect that water in buckets and then scoop it using a tin cup out of there. What they seem not to understand is that the buckets they are collecting in are filled with the same water-borne diseases that one would find in a nearby stream or river. After translation help from Gandhi, the workers seemed to understand that if they weren’t going to use the filter on a daily basis they at least needed to dump few buckets of water through the filter in the morning or evening. Anyways, although I have not yet convinced them to fill their glasses from the filter with every meal, we have compromised that they will at least maintain the filter in order to use it when they are so inspired. As I was a newcomer to the LAFTI community, it was not in my interest to alienate myself by forcing them to complete a task about which they were not truly understanding of the reasons behind. So, we poured a few jugs of water into the filter to get it running again and called it a day. This was the beginning of my real work, of my journey down the path of real development, learning and understanding the very detailed line between helping, imposing, and offending. Even if using the filter is in my view and others, scientifically the best thing to do, all transitions take time and a feeling of ownership over each transition is often the most crucial motivator for any changes to be made. I think today, we agreed on the establishment of mutual education and understanding, and that is no simple task on either end. They were able to understand why the filter is important in my view, and I was able to recognize that most all of the men and their families who I was speaking with have been perfectly fine (well, relative speaking, until they get sick) without it until this point and thus using this filter would be a change not only for them as individuals but for their community as a whole.