Sañayca saga...

Sañayca is a village that received a very successful water project (i.e. one that involved not just construction, but change of attitudes and therefore ongoing improvement) through CARE and their sanitation programme a few years ago.  It was mentioned to me in my visit to the Cusco CARE office, and then again when I made contact with the local government office here.  So I have the phone number of the mayor and have been planning to arrange a visit.

The problem is that I put off phone calls for quite a long time because 1) my mobile is not great and even in English I find it hard to hear what people are saying, 2) conversations don't happen in English, they happen in Spanish, and it's harder to hear when you can't see people's faces and 3) signal in the villages is worse and so it's even harder to hear.

Last week: I finally bite the bullet and make this phone call that I have been putting off for nearly a month.

It is just as bad as I expect.

I ring the mayor of Sañayca and can only hear about half of what he says, because he is in the middle of nowhere... and speaking Spanish of course.  Then he says (I think) that they are having a big meeting tomorrow and I can come then – but then I am panicked because I don’t know how to get there yet and whether I even can for any useful time tomorrow because the buses are complicated... then he said talk to the local government office because they know.

Except that the local government guy (Omar) is probably getting fed up with me because at the moment I am emailing or ringing or turning up at his office every week with some enquiry.  But anyway, I call him and eventually work out that instead of going to Sañayca tomorrow I can turn up at some training event they are all coming to Abancay for – tomorrow.  So I know where it is and what time to go there.  Except that I have no idea what this training thing is actually about.

The next day, I go down to the town hall in the morning and they tell me no, no-one from Sañayca is coming.  I ring Omar (again) to check, and yes I am in the right place, I just didn't know the name of the training meeting.  Equipped with this open sesame, I go back to the town hall and this time get in.  But almost no-one has arrived for the training yet because I am only 10 minutes late.  I leave my name and number with the lady on the door who says she will call me when they arrive.

This works.  About lunchtime I get a text message, and about 4pm I go down again as I figure they will be finishing soon.  At the end of the session I go and interrupt Omar (who has just finished leading the training day) to get him to introduce me to the right people.  But, finally, there I am, speaking to the people I hoped to meet, and explaining about AIDIA and that I would like to visit Sañayca and their water project.

The water system manager says "Great".

Then he says "We should set up a visit.  You should ring me next week.  Here's my number."

...

I go home, envisioning an unending process of incomprehensible phone calls.

This time I decide that I have had enough, and I enlist Noemí, who works at AIDIA, to help me.  She phones up and after several back-and-forths they ring me back when she is not there, but encouraged by her help I manage to arrange a visit for Friday afternoon.

The journey involves a 2-hour bus followed by a half-hour taxi ride (returning is slightly complicated by the fact that our taxi doesn't wait for us).  And when we get there we discover that the CARE project wasn't actually in the village of Sañayca - it was in a smaller village in the district of Sañayca.  ("Here is the mayor's phone number - you can call him to arrange a visit...").  BUT this is all unimportant as we meet with the district mayor and the water system manager and hear a lot from them about the project.  They attribute its success to the fact that a trainer lived in the village for about 3 months before any construction work started, teaching about hygiene and management and making sure people were on-board, and stayed through to completion.  I am amazingly encouraged to hear that the system is being used properly, maintained and improved (and I believe it, because they show me the one here as well and explain their maintenance and management systems).

Elements of the water project - these models were given to the village on completion of the training programme

A break-pressure tank: in one piece, clean, and locked - a great improvement on many

Looking up to the water tank - very impressed that it's in a locked compound

The water system manager explains the cleaning schedule - each street takes its turn each month to clean and disinfect the spring and the tank.

They are also interested to hear about the work AIDIA does, and talk with Noemí about the possibility of some teaching sessions.  I am glad that they might get something out of the visit as well as answering so many of my queries.


This whole process has been a major triumph - in doing things that are difficult, in being willing to look stupid, and in asking for help - as well of course as actually finding out about what made the Sañayca project so successful.

Proof that I made it to Sañayca eventually!