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Our team in Malawi had plans to work with 136,000 people
across the rural area.
We chose Bokola and Kaniche as a representative community who
were willing to open up their hearts and their lives and tell the UK public
what it was like to live without clean water and safe sanitation.
The issues that affected
the people of Bokola and Kaniche,
these included
inaccess to safe water, they were getting water from running rivers
but in the dry season they'd be
digging scoop holes in the river beds.
So many of the people that we met on that visit
had incredible stories to tell,
but two people struck me the most.
Howard, a 17 year old boy, living in Bokola
was one of the only children I could find who actually went to school.
And even so he very rarely got to go.
In Kaniche I met Mary, a 22 year old mother of 2 young girls.
A mother who is *** positive and her youngest daughter is 2.
Mary needs clean water more than anyone else to keep herself fit and healthy.
The Big Dig launched on 18 June
with the help of 31 commercial radio stations across the UK.
With this project we wanted to give our supporters the chance to really get to know
the people whose lives we were going to change.
And to see for themselves the real impact of their support.
We did this by equipping our two partner staff, Michael and Nathan with simple mobile phones.
And they used Instagram to capture simple photos
and stories of work that was happening, day-in day-out in Bokola and Kaniche.
In the normal project, we just go to the community,
talk to them about hygiene
without taking some photos.
But with this it was like
part of motivating them,
when they saw you taking a photo and tell them that
"Oh this photo, we'll send it to the UK".
So they know that next time today I don't have a latrine,
I need to have a latrine so that when they take a photo of me and send it to the UK.
So it was also, it also contributes to the participation of the communities.
We created a simple blog, thebigdig.org, to
which we uploaded the photos and the stories that Michael and Nathan were capturing,
every single day of their visits to the villages.
The Big Dig also gave WaterAid the chance to use social platforms in a way we never had done before.
Thanks to Facebook, YouTube and Twitter,
the amazing content being created in the villages was shared worldwide,
bringing with it a whole legion of WaterAid supporters.
The UK government pledged to match all donations to The Big Dig campaign,
over a 12 week period, from 18 June to 18 September.
We set out to raise £1.2 million and
on week 5 we already reached it.
Through The Big Dig,
we saw a real contrast between progress and pain.
Because while the community members were making huge steps, building latrines and
creating handwashing facilities,
we also saw the worsening water crisis.
Meaning that people were still getting sick,
women were still spending hours and hours collecting small amounts of water
to feed their children.
Three months on and the change is remarkable.
Toilets have been constructed, hygiene messages can be seen all around this village.
About 40m beneath this peg,
there is something precious, something that can transform lives forever -
safe, clean water.
When those trucks began to drive into Bokola and Kaniche,
not only were the community as excited about the water that was about to come,
but the supporters who had made that happen were all on the edge of their seats too.
We've hit water
and it's time to celebrate!
This is what you've achieved
in just one summer.
Hitting water
in Bokola and Kaniche was the climax of The Big Dig.
Being part of something that created so much celebration and which signifed
the start of a transformation for two communities, is something
every single person involved in this campaign can be truly proud of.
There'll be no stopping here.
Over the next 3 years, thousands of people across Malawi are going to experience the same joy, celebration and gratitude.
So we aimed for £1.2 million and in fact we doubled it.
We funded the whole of the rural programme in Malawi and
we've also funded some of our urban work too.
Meaning close to 200,000 people across Malawi are going to benefit as a result of The Big Dig.