Day 5! - Water Investigation

Today we went to Modimola Village to investigate the water pumps Cllr Bettrand had told us about the day before. We were curious to find out the reasons behind why the play pump was not working.

When we arrived we met with a neighbouring woman and her children who told us that the pump had previously worked, but it doesn’t anymore.

We went to check out another play pump in the village, which was working fine. To find out more information we visited the house of Cllr Bettrand. Unfortunately she was not home, however two of her family members were. We asked them what they thought about the play pump. They said that they are a great idea, but they are best built in schools – not in the village because they are meant to be used by children. They said this is because the children are too tired to pump the water when they come home from school, so the older women have to pump the water. They also said that there was a generator that supplied the village with water.

Other things we noticed in the village:
The river was dry, as it had been dammed further up stream
Some of the water taps were dry
Pumps were situated where there was water underground. This did not make it easy for people to access water because their houses were too far away from the bore. The South African Government has mandated that water should be no further than 200m away.