When we came to Lositeti to determine where our domestic rainwater harvesting systems were most urgently needed, we met Angela. She was eight months pregnant, and her shy smile revealed teeth stained by toxic levels of volcanic fluoride in the groundwater.
It felt like an invitation to make a world of change.
Her neighbor, also pregnant, shared a similar due date, and it seemed natural that she should receive a tank too. But when the husband learned that he’d have to help gather rocks to build the foundation, he declined, choosing instead for his wife to continue walking for water.
As our team of women set to work on Angela’s tank, heavy clouds swelled, ready to spill the sky. In Angela’s belly, a whole new life was waiting to unfold. On the seventh day, the tank was complete, the rain had swept in, and we stepped back to let the future unfold.
We returned a month later. Lositeti after rain is almost unrecognizable: parched red dust had given way to vibrant green growth. Angela’s belly was empty; Daniel had been born. Her arms were as full as her heart – and her tank.
Her neighbor, who gave birth to twins, bore more than double her workload, with water to fetch on top of nursing two newborns. But one thing we’ve learned from Lositeti is that abundance begets generosity. Angela once borrowed water, and now she shares her own.
She is looking forward to growing vegetables, she says – and planting trees. She wants cool, dappled shade, and to invite more rain. Planting a tree is a gift to your children, and their children… an act whose generosity stretches as long as the life of the tree.
Without water, life hardly extends beyond today. It is measured in steps taken, buckets carried, hours lost… Angela’s tank expands the horizon of what is possible.
This Mother’s Day, she welcomes Daniel into a world made new by water.
