After all those celebrations, on Thursday, we went back to work and planned a visit to Achinakom to check up on the construction progress.

On our way to the village, we first stopped at a private hospital to visit Smrt. Sali, the President of KJMTVFS, a women’s self-help group located in Kerala that has over 8,000 members and aids screwpine workers. Smrt. Sali was present at the meeting Chrisina held in Achinakom in January about the potential of rainwater harvesting and announced her support for our program. Unfortunately, she was recently hospitalized due to complications from diabetes but has been steadily getting stronger.

We talked to her for almost two hours with Sylas as our translator; she has been active in social work for forty years and her primary mission has been the empowerment of local women. She founded the aforementioned self-help group in 1997 when she saw how screwpine workers were being cheated out of profits by middlemen and their raw materials were being depleted. Over the past twelve years, the organization has grown to support over 6,000 families. There are six local societies that are then overseen by an Apex committee, and women manage the entire operation. They provide marketing support and training for women working with screwpine or coir, as well as coordinate awareness programs for women empowerment. Their principal activities also include providing health insurance for all the member families and scholarships for needy children from ninth through twelfth standards.

Smrt. Sali emphasized how a family’s well-being starts with the woman of the family. The income a woman earns gets completely invested in her family and future. Furthermore, when a woman attains any education, she passes it on to other generations, as well as among her neighbors and social network. For these reasons, she approves of our project. One suggestion she gave us was to provide a stipend for women as they undergo the training program. We enjoyed our conversation and learned a lot; we wish her a speedy recovery.

The masons were working on putting the final layer of chicken wire around the walls of the tank.

From the hospital, we made our way to Achinakom. Progress has definitely been made on the prototype. The RCC layer is almost complete and the reinforcement for the aboveground portion of the wall has been put in place. While we there, the masons were applying another layer of mortar to the walls; they were applying water and then slapping on and smoothing the cement mixture. The entire tank was almost covered with the first layer of mortar. Progress was not made without obstacles (the area had received a lot of rain in the past couple of days—it is monsoon season—and the neighboring canals had recharged), but they had been dealt with and work was continuing fairly smoothly. 

On Friday, we returned to Achinakom with the hopes of interviewing more women and trying to get a better sense of their mindsets and perceptions. After briefly stopping by the construction site, we walked through the village, this time with Daniya as our translator, and stopped when we met two women going about their daily chores. They agreed to take a break and talk with us, so they brought out chairs and we all sat down. Within minutes, five more women joined us and spiritedly and eagerly answered our questions.

The women (their names are Prasanna, Usha , Rathi, Omana, Knjumol, Rajamma, Mini Prashannan, Mini Shivadas, and

The village women took a break from their chores to talk to us.

Mini Lalappan) currently earn about Rs. 125 ($2.50) a day; they emphasized that they need to work everyday to have money for food for the next day. They work on rice paddies about two months out of the year and, during the other months, make items out of screwpine and coir rope. When asked what they would do if they had extra money, they responded that they don’t see that happening, but, hypothetically, they would save anything extra for the children. The women stressed that it made a difference whether they or their husbands earned income. The women invest all the money they earn in their families. Men, on the other hand, don’t come straight home after work, and they spend some of their earnings on chai, toddy (coconut alcohol), cigarettes, and other superfluous items and also take breaks throughout the day. Smrt. Sali, as have many developing world experts, mentioned this same pattern.

We also talked with the village women about the time and energy they spend gathering water; some of them wake up at 4 AM to go to the well, returning home at around 6:30. They mentioned that they very thankful for our efforts because we are the first people to try and improve their water supply; even the Panchayath has not tried to do anything about this problem they are facing. Though they are glad to cooperate with us, help in the maintenance of the first prototype (they are all future users), and work during the construction, they were hesitant when we asked them about the training program we hope to put in place. They are worried that they would not be confident in the work and could not handle the heavy loads. However, they would participate in the program if there was a stipend and a professional mason supervised the work.

Their feedback reinforced our plans for the next prototype: to design a system that will be made out of lighter material, which is easier to handle, and yet will still be durable and withstand the construction difficulties posed by the high water table and differential settlement. Before leaving, we walked around the entire village with GPS to map the main pathways. 

Saturday, we attended two SES students’ wedding. It is a love marriage, uncommon in this area. About eighty percent of marriages are arranged.

On Eli’s and my final full day in Kerala, we again visited Achinakom. We stopped en route at a store, located in the backyard of someone’s home, that sells concrete rings that are commonly used to build wells. We’re looking into the possibility of using them in the next design. Eli and I won’t be here to see the completion of the system, which is nearing completion. The final layers of mortar are currently being applied on the walls of the subsurface part of the tank; the supports for the walls have been made. There’ll be a break in construction for Onam festivities, which officially start next week. (MGU celebrated early, while all the students were still here.)

The mason, village women, Eli, I, and Christina in front of the system

Eli and I are sadly saying goodbye to Kerala tomorrow morning and flying to New York through Delhi, but stay tuned for the next blog entries from MGU. Christina will be here until December and will be working with the MGU student team. Her plans include: tracking the impact of the system by administering the survey we created; further developing the organizational structure of our group; and starting construction on the next prototype. As soon as school starts, the Brown team will also be hard at work experimenting with some new materials, fundraising, and revising the original design.

Our week so far had been productive but had included a lot of traveling—we hadn’t been at MGU for enough hours to finish conducting our analysis of the water samples. Hence, Tuesday evening, we started our work in the SES microbiology lab and prepared mediums to repeat the E. coli tests with diluted samples to get a more precise count of the bacteria. Once the test tubes went into the incubator, we headed to bed for much-deserved rest.

Wednesday morning, we prepared the other tests of our analysis. We started with the simpler tests and determined the pH of each sample, as well as the TDS (Total Dissolved Solids). Then, we measured out our samples in beakers, boiled water, and added drops of indicators and chemicals to test tubes, following the procedures to measure the phosphate, nitrate, and iron content of each sample. Each step of the way, we had an MGU student helping us and showing us around the labs; thank you, Daniyal! Our analysis stretched into the evening, when we received good news from Sylas: the groundwater had stopped seeping into the canal, and the first layers of concrete were officially setting! Construction would continue Thursday with the placement of the RCC (reinforced cement concrete) layer. Concrete would be laid on a frame, built of chicken mesh and a rebar grid, made against the floor and walls of tank. Our water sampling analysis would therefore be put on hold and would continue Friday morning—we unfortunately couldn’t finish because of the necessary waiting time in some of the procedures.   

The mason's workers, MGU students, and Eli worked to bind the rebar grid.

In the morning, we set off for Achinakom in a van—enough room for about 10 MGU SES students that came along with us. Our efforts to recruit local students last week were successful and ten men had enthusiastically volunteered to assist the mason, workers, villagers, and three of us during construction on Thursday. (On a side-note, we plan to have an orientation meeting for everybody else that didn’t get a chance to go on Thursday next week and will hopefully attract an even larger crowd.) We inspected the canal upon arriving and the concrete had indeed dried; workers had already laid the chicken mesh along the walls and were starting to bind together the rebar grid on the floor of the tank and the surrounding walls. A couple of us jumped into the tank and started twisting the wires and completing the grid.Taking turns, we squatted on the muddy floor, hunched over the crisscrossing rebar while nimbly trying to twist the tie wire. 

Everybody helped transport the mortar from the front of the house to the masons in the canal.

In the afternoon, a few men started mixing the mortar while all the students and village women lined up in an assembly line to transport the mortar from the front of the house, where the materials were originally delivered, along the narrow pathway that leads to the canal. The mortar was placed onto metal basins and thrown or handed down the line to the masons at the end, who proceeded to lay the mortar on the floor of the tank. Moving so much heavy material was a tedious task, but wheelbarrows are hard to maneuver around the house to the canal and space to mix the mortar behind the house is also lacking. Furthermore, trying to coordinate a more efficient way is difficult with the language barrier. Nevertheless, everyone persevered and work didn’t cease even when the heavy rains started. More tarps were draped from the roof over the tank to protect the mortar and everyone else continued as they had been working.  

Patterns of division of gender in the work were similar as on the first day of construction—though they have expressed interest in learning masonry techniques, women mainly delegated themselves to helping move the materials, while masons and experienced men worked on mixing and laying the mortar. We will have to motivate and help the women gain confidence throughout the rest of the construction process, so they will feel comfortable on taking on the tasks usually done by men. The floor of the tank was completed by the late afternoon, and everyone, soaked to the bone, took a break to eat dinner prepared by the village women. We soon departed the village with the MGU students, traveling back to the SES on the same van; even though everybody was working hard all day, physical exhaustion wasn’t apparent on the bus. Malayalam songs were playing loudly while many students were singing and clapping along—a few even managed to start dancing in the aisle.

We had a day of relaxation on Wednesday sight-seeing with the Bulls, but Thursday, once they left MGU, we went straight back to work. We churned out another version of the questionnaire, updating it based on our first three interviews and feedback from the Bulls, Sylas, and our peers at Brown. Before continuing with our survey, we want to make sure we are asking thorough questions in a clear and concise manner and getting all the information we’ll need in the future to track our impact and strengthen our efforts to expand. With this goal in mind, on Friday, we talked to Professor Sukumana at MGU’s Department of Behavioral Sciences. He encouraged us to include scaled questions about the villagers’ quality of life in an effort to get more continuous and in-depth data. After hearing his advice, we trooped back to our office in SES and, with the help of Sylas, revised the survey one more time.

We woke up early Saturday morning to attend the flag-raising ceremony in honor of Indian Independence Day; the vice-chancellor, along with MGU’s guards, raised the flag as the Indian national anthem played. Afterwards, the guards helped serve breakfast: dosa, chicken curry, a sweet dessert, and milky chai.

The flag-raising ceremony at MGU

Our plan for the afternoon was to go to Achinakom to collect water samples around the village from sources that people used for bathing, washing eating vessels, drinking, and cooking. We therefore spent most of the morning in the Environmental Microbiology lab with one of the PhD. students, preparing test tubes for E. Coli testing and sterilizing containers. On our way to Achinakom, we stopped to talk to a water truck vendor, hoping to get a sample of his water to test. However, water trucks only provide to villagers in the dry season and currently sell water to the large hotels in the area, so we couldn’t attain a sample. We did learn that they purchase their water from a well in Kottayam.

A water truck

Upon arriving in Achinakom, we stopped by the construction site to monitor the progress that has been made. Construction has been delayed due to the amount of water that has been seeping into the tank, which is preventing the concrete from setting properly; the heavy rainfall the area received Friday night aggravated the situation. The mason and his workers have tried plastering and adding an extra layer of cement in the spots through which water is entering to no avail. The next solution they will attempt is draining the two neighboring canals in an effort to slow the seepage enough for the concrete to harden and the reinforced concrete to be layered on top. Hopefully, when we come back to the site on Tuesday, we will join the workers and villagers in applying the RCC.

Water keeps seeping into the canal, causing delays

We then walked through the village, moving westward, collecting water samples; gathering the samples was informative, as we saw firsthand the various water sources and how hygiene was being upheld or compromised on both a community and individual level. For example, we saw some outhouses built directly next to canals, which are used primarily for washing and bathing. 

We also noted the different levels of caution and cleanliness with which people treated their water. All three permanent rainwater harvesting systems we got water from were above-ground tanks subsidized by World Vision, a non-profit that had worked in the area, and were built approximately two years ago, but they were being maintained with ranging levels of diligence. The first one we stopped at had moss and mold growing on top of it and appeared to have tiny cracks; the catchment surface, the roof of the house, was dirty and also covered in moss. The tap was not that high off the ground, so only short basins could fit under it, and the surrounding area was not cleared away. Nevertheless, we were pleased to learn that that the family cleaned the tank annually and claimed to properly utilize the first flush system. The second system, shared by five families, appeared to be better maintained, and the third system featured a unique first flush and well-kept area for a bucket to be placed underneath the tap.

A permanent rainwater harvesting tank and the catchment surface

An above-ground rainwater harvesting system, gutter system, and first flush

We also collected water from three temporary rainwater harvesting structures. All were built comparably with some kind of tarp affixed to posts at the corners so water would run off the tarp into a bucket, though they had slight differences (one family, for example, had weighted down the center of the edge of the tarp with a stick and bottle). The tarps had accumulated varying degrees of dirt and dust; one family had put a cloth over the bucket to filter out the debris. We will see how the samples vary in our laboratory analysis.

Collecting water from a temporary rainwater harvesting system

Temporary system's tarp and bucket: a cloth is being used to filter out dust and dirt

We obtained a sample from the village well, which is 20 feet deep and looked relatively clean and clear, especially compared to some of the wells we saw on the properties of individual households. We also got water from a well that is located in a canal and has a built-in filtration system using river sand. It filters groundwater that seeps in through the bottom and also stores rainwater.

Well with built-in filtration system in canal

Villagers use water from the aforementioned sources primary for drinking and cooking, but we also acquired water from a pond and a large canal. Four families use the small pond for bathing and washing eating vessels. Plants were growing in it and the water looked cloudy and mucky, which was, according to one family who uses it, due to Friday’s rainfall and a marked change from its usual, clear appearance. The people of the village use the canals solely for bathing purposes. Near our collection site in the canal, water used for irrigation of the rice paddies was being pumped into it. Eli while reaching to get a sample, fell into the waist-deep water. He climbed out, almost losing his flip-flops in the deep silt and voicing his desire to take a shower.

We returned to the guesthouse with our ten samples and plan to start our analysis in the morning. We stopped for dinner on the way; over the past two weeks, we have gradually been getting to know the names of everything that we’ve been eating. We no longer have to pester Sylas with questions about every item on the menu—only occasional ones.

Thursday morning, we left MGU with Mr. Sylas in the early afternoon headed to Achinakom, questionnaires for the future users of the system in hand. On our way to the first household, we passed by a woman who was making ropes from coir (coconut fibers found between the husk and outer shell of the coconut) and made a detour when she offered to give us a demonstration. The fibers are placed on a hook on a wheel that is then turned by hand; another wheel is spun to tighten the rope.  Coir-making is a common income-raising activity undertaken by the women of Achinakom; this particular woman said she could make 100 bundles in a full day and received Rs. 1.25 per bundle. As we said goodbye, Andrea leaned in a little too close to the rope as it was being tightened and had some hair woven in with the coconut fibers; luckily, she pulled away before losing her entire ponytail and we proceeded to the house of the family who owns the canal in which the rainwater harvesting system will be built without any more mishaps.

With Sylas as our translator, we started talking to two women of the house. This family basically donated the land for the system and agreed to community access, but they will sign a contract with the rest of the community members and get compensation (the amount will be decided by the users’ committee) for the next two years to guarantee these conditions. They were enthusiastic about volunteering the land, citing the problem of water scarcity in the area and the hope that this system will improve the situation as their motivations. They currently buy water from a private vendor about once every three weeks, spending Rs. 100 for 500 liters, or sometimes walk to the well. The women we interviewed talked about both the health and social effects of the water scarcity; for example, they mentioned how there have been cases when marriage arrangements between Achinakom’s men and women from other villages have been cancelled because the women’s families are worried about the lack of drinking water.

Before heading back to MGU for the night, we went to Dr. John’s house, whose family uses their own 5,000-L tank. After talking to the mason and engineer on Wednesday, we realized we had several questions about the gravel-and-sand filters that are typically used and concerns about how fast water will flow through the filter. We, therefore, went to Dr. John’s to test the flow rate of the filter of his tank, curious about the possibility of the filter overflowing during intense rainfalls. Using many, many buckets of water, flashlights, a stopwatch, and the help of Dr. John’s entire family, we did some basic experiments and timed the flow rate of the water after saturating the filter.  We observed that the water actually flows through the tank fairly quickly (about .6 liters per second), much faster than we had expected, and celebrated our work by partaking in some local delicacies offered by Dr. John’s wife and mother: coconut milk, coconuts, and cookies.

We left the guesthouse on Friday morning directly after breakfast, ready for a busy and productive day. First, we had an appointment at the Primary Health Clinic near Achinakom so that we could talk to its doctor about water-borne diseases, their prevalence in the region, and metrics to measure their severity. The PHC serves the surrounding population of 17,294 people (4,355 households); treatment there is free, aside from the Rs. 1 administrative fee. It was a routine morning for the clinic, and many women carrying or leading children by the hand were lined up outside its doors.

Talking to the doctor, we learned that, in the surrounding region, instances of water-borne diseases have actually been decreasing, which he attributed to increased health education. For example, there have been no cases of cholera since 2000 and no record of neither typhoid nor dysentery; however, there are a few cases of hepatitis A and Weil’s Diseases every year, along with several cases of mild diarrhea (101 in 2008, 64 through May of 2009). However, though the people of this region enjoy relatively good health, these statistics are not uniform throughout Kuttanad, and places like Allepi, downriver from Achinakom, have much higher rates of water-borne diseases. Our visit with the doctor put our plans for the future and ways to measure our impact a bit more in perspective. The doctor emphasized how, though education about safe water practices has been spreading, it is common for people to clean eating vessels and utensils in canal or well water, thereby contracting diseases. We should incorporate education about diseases and safety to fully have an impact.

From there, we drove to Achinakom to continue conducting our questionnaires. We first talked to a man in a fairly large home. He and his wife own some rice paddies; to contrast, many of the neighboring men are day laborers and the women are coir-makers. Fairly often, he bikes about fifteen minutes to a nearby well to collect water; he bikes to spare his wife the thirty-minute walk carrying heavy cans of water. In the past year, nobody in his family suffered from any water-borne diseases, but he would prefer to use the rainwater collected in the future tank. He noted that rainwater is much better for cooking; water from the well sometimes leaves a foul odor or taste on the rice.

We walked farther down the path, looking for another family that was home, when we came to a household in front of which the entire family was sitting. A couple of hours earlier, we were listening to the doctor list symptoms and numerical statistics. Here, we had to confront the realities and consequences of water-borne diseases. The mother of the family had passed away a few days prior due to Weil’s Disease, which her husband thinks she contracted while working in rice paddy fields. We spoke only for a few minutes before moving onwards, leaving our condolences.

We talked to one more woman before leaving Achinakom; to generate income, she makes screw-pine mats and baskets. Her family spends, on average, between Rs. 150 and 250 per month buying water from the water vendor. They bathe mainly in the canal water, but, sometimes, in the peak summer months the canal is dry and they spend even more money buying water. She expressed concern about the community sharing the tank because she thinks that, during the dry season, villagers from the western side of Achinakom, where the water need is greater, will come and the water in the tank will not be sufficient. However, she understands that this system is only a prototype and is aware of our hopes to scale up.

Our day was not over yet: from Achinakom, we traveled back to Kottayam to meet with the chief scientist, Dr. George Abe, at the Center for Water Resource Development and Management (a prominent research foundation funded by the state of Kerala); he, along with the University Engineer, was consulted on the design originally proposed and the modifications made. We discussed the merits and obstacles in using silpaulin, the tarp-like material that was to function as the storage tank in our initial design. Its use in a system would be economical due to its low cost but it presents technical issues; because of the soil quality, the walls of the system would collapse in when the silpaulin container would be empty. Also, it most likely could not be used in a community-size system, which Dr. George believes to be more efficient and cost-effective in the area since the canals could be utilized. Furthermore, silpaulin’s effect on the water quality over the long-term has yet to be tested. Even with these expressed reservations, Dr. George encouraged experimentation with silpaulin. He also cautioned us about the conflicts that can arise among the families using the system and the need for careful monitoring of the water in the system.

With a lot to ponder, we returned to MGU for our usual dinner of chappatti and vegetable curry. Saturday, we plan to take the bus to Kottayam to do some exploring.