By Marisa Kitjatanapan (Student Coordinator) on June 20th
On June 12th, 2016, myself and a small group consisting of the Dreams We Believe In coordinators and volunteers travelled to Lopburi to officially inaugurate the new water filtering system that we have purchased for the Baan Gerda community. The installation of the water filtering system all started from a trip during December of 2015.
As students in an international school, we celebrate a variety of holidays and one of the main ones is Christmas. We were up at Baan Gerda to celebrate Christmas with the children and care takers and also giving them the gifts that our NIST community have given to them. Since we were all in the Christmas spirit, we asked the Baan Gerda community what is the necessary things that they are lacking. By asking that, we realized that Baan Gerda did not have easy access to clean purified drinking water or water for their basic sanitary needs.
When we got back to Bangkok, the coordinators and I did some research on the topic of hygiene and sanitation and came across an interesting finding. According the United Nations, on the 28th of July, 2010, through the resolution 64/292, the United Nations General Assembly recognized that access to clean water and sanitation is a basic human right.
UN’s Statement of Clean Water as a Basic Human Right - Resolution 64/292:
• Sufficient. The water supply for each person must be sufficient and continuous for personal and domestic uses. These uses ordinarily include drinking, personal sanitation, washing of clothes, food preparation, personal and household hygiene. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), between 50 and 100 liters of water per person per day are needed to ensure that most basic needs are met and few health concerns arise.
• Physically accessible. Everyone has the right to a water and sanitation service that is physically accessible within, or in the immediate vicinity of the household, educational institution, workplace or health institution. According to WHO, the water source has to be within 1,000 meters of the home and collection time should not exceed 30 minutes.
• Safe. The water required for each personal or domestic use must be safe, therefore free from microorganisms, chemical substances and radiological hazards that constitute a threat to a person's health. Measures of drinking-water safety are usually defined by national and/or local standards for drinking-water quality. The World Health Organization (WHO) Guidelines for drinking-water quality provide a basis for the development of national standards that, if properly implemented, will ensure the safety of drinking water.
Source: http://www.un.org/waterforlifedecade/human_right_to_water.shtml
After that, we knew that we had to take action and that was the beginning of our “H2O - Helping Hands 2 Orphans” Water project.
Our goal for this H2O project was to raise enough money to provide Baan Gerda with the water treatment system that will provide clean water for domestic use and is compatible with the resources at the village. The system that we were looking to purchase cost 88,000THB.
We then began thinking of how we will fundraise to subsidize the filtering system and later on introduced our project to the rest of the NIST community.
The Year 10 ARTS Enrichment Learners program organized a fundraising event showcasing the three different arts (music, art, drama) and directed their funds towards the Helping Hands 2 Orphans water project. They focused on the theme of discrimination in society which relates to the problem we as the DWBI service group are trying to eliminate. The drama students put on an interesting rendition of “RENT: The Musical”, the music students performed solo pieces, duets, a group performance of “Love Will Set You Free” by Kodaline, and the art students hosted a very successful art auction with artwork and photographs created by the enrichment learners. The funds that they raised from ticket sales and the auction were more than enough for us to buy the new water filtering system for Baan Gerda to which we are very grateful for.
Following the fundraising event organized by the Year 10 ARTS Enrichment Learners, parents and teachers contacted us and donated money to help support our project.
But Baan Gerda still needs another treatment system that will treat the water to a finer degree to make the water safe to drink. This system will cost 60,000THB. Aurelien Delaval, an alumNIST from the class of 2011, will be biking across Norway the summer of 2016 in which he will raise funds through his Biking For Baan Gerda fundraiser to buy this drinking water filtering system. We (DWBI) will help coordinate the purchase as well as the installation of the system.
On the day that we went up Baan Gerda to cut the ribbon, I am sure that pride was happiness was coursing through all of the coordinators and volunteers veins because we worked extremely hard to achieve our goal of providing this essential water filtering system for a community that we feel is important to us. We celebrated by playing football, badminton, eating lunch, and just having a great time with them. All in all, it was a great experience and we’re definitely not done just yet!
On June 12th, 2016, myself and a small group consisting of the Dreams We Believe In coordinators and volunteers travelled to Lopburi to officially inaugurate the new water filtering system that we have purchased for the Baan Gerda community. The installation of the water filtering system all started from a trip during December of 2015.
As students in an international school, we celebrate a variety of holidays and one of the main ones is Christmas. We were up at Baan Gerda to celebrate Christmas with the children and care takers and also giving them the gifts that our NIST community have given to them. Since we were all in the Christmas spirit, we asked the Baan Gerda community what is the necessary things that they are lacking. By asking that, we realized that Baan Gerda did not have easy access to clean purified drinking water or water for their basic sanitary needs.
When we got back to Bangkok, the coordinators and I did some research on the topic of hygiene and sanitation and came across an interesting finding. According the United Nations, on the 28th of July, 2010, through the resolution 64/292, the United Nations General Assembly recognized that access to clean water and sanitation is a basic human right.
UN’s Statement of Clean Water as a Basic Human Right - Resolution 64/292:
• Sufficient. The water supply for each person must be sufficient and continuous for personal and domestic uses. These uses ordinarily include drinking, personal sanitation, washing of clothes, food preparation, personal and household hygiene. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), between 50 and 100 liters of water per person per day are needed to ensure that most basic needs are met and few health concerns arise.
• Physically accessible. Everyone has the right to a water and sanitation service that is physically accessible within, or in the immediate vicinity of the household, educational institution, workplace or health institution. According to WHO, the water source has to be within 1,000 meters of the home and collection time should not exceed 30 minutes.
• Safe. The water required for each personal or domestic use must be safe, therefore free from microorganisms, chemical substances and radiological hazards that constitute a threat to a person's health. Measures of drinking-water safety are usually defined by national and/or local standards for drinking-water quality. The World Health Organization (WHO) Guidelines for drinking-water quality provide a basis for the development of national standards that, if properly implemented, will ensure the safety of drinking water.
Source: http://www.un.org/waterforlifedecade/human_right_to_water.shtml
After that, we knew that we had to take action and that was the beginning of our “H2O - Helping Hands 2 Orphans” Water project.
Our goal for this H2O project was to raise enough money to provide Baan Gerda with the water treatment system that will provide clean water for domestic use and is compatible with the resources at the village. The system that we were looking to purchase cost 88,000THB.
We then began thinking of how we will fundraise to subsidize the filtering system and later on introduced our project to the rest of the NIST community.
The Year 10 ARTS Enrichment Learners program organized a fundraising event showcasing the three different arts (music, art, drama) and directed their funds towards the Helping Hands 2 Orphans water project. They focused on the theme of discrimination in society which relates to the problem we as the DWBI service group are trying to eliminate. The drama students put on an interesting rendition of “RENT: The Musical”, the music students performed solo pieces, duets, a group performance of “Love Will Set You Free” by Kodaline, and the art students hosted a very successful art auction with artwork and photographs created by the enrichment learners. The funds that they raised from ticket sales and the auction were more than enough for us to buy the new water filtering system for Baan Gerda to which we are very grateful for.
Following the fundraising event organized by the Year 10 ARTS Enrichment Learners, parents and teachers contacted us and donated money to help support our project.
But Baan Gerda still needs another treatment system that will treat the water to a finer degree to make the water safe to drink. This system will cost 60,000THB. Aurelien Delaval, an alumNIST from the class of 2011, will be biking across Norway the summer of 2016 in which he will raise funds through his Biking For Baan Gerda fundraiser to buy this drinking water filtering system. We (DWBI) will help coordinate the purchase as well as the installation of the system.
On the day that we went up Baan Gerda to cut the ribbon, I am sure that pride was happiness was coursing through all of the coordinators and volunteers veins because we worked extremely hard to achieve our goal of providing this essential water filtering system for a community that we feel is important to us. We celebrated by playing football, badminton, eating lunch, and just having a great time with them. All in all, it was a great experience and we’re definitely not done just yet!