Ruth Nanyanzi is a Form 3 student of Iganga girls Secondary School. She comes from the village of Iguliryo in Kaliro district in Eastern Uganda.
Every holiday she spends a week at home in the village. Her village is not connected into the national grid and so she is restricted to daytime hours to get that extra study needed to compete with the students from the urban areas of the country who get extra hours in the night to do their holiday study.
Currently her home is located 2km away fro the nearest borehole. She has to go there three times every day which adds to a total of 12 kms. This makes her lose a lot of time that could have been used for study and as a result she has much less time for study and for her social time as well. However, there is a borehole right in front of the house where she lives that has been non functional for about 5 years.
When I first went to this area, I did not recognize it as it had been overgrown by a bush in the middle of the garden.
Presently this borehole has been rehabilitated, much to the delight of the community. Ruth is currently at school preparing for what we used to call “Moscow” exams ( the exams the year before finals). When she gets home and gets the motions going to prepare for her final year, she will be extayic at the prospect of going 12 km less every day to collect safe water.