Working on Water Projects

This week we have had our water specialists Jim and Karen Greding from California here to help us with water projects.  They are over the water projects that LDS Charities or Deseret International Charities build in several countries ranging from Africa, to Nepal to Mongolia.  They have just been assigned to Mongolia so felt it necessary to come and see the country, the people's needs and how things are done here.  They have served in Kenya doing amazing projects there.  They also served in Indonesia after the big typhoon and in Haiti after the devastating  earthquake.  They are an amazing couple, full of great knowledge and experience and will be very helpful in finding sustainable water projects.

The following pictures are of a water station that has never been fully fuctional because electricity has not been brought in.  DIC paid for it but it never happened.  We have the invoice paying for the materials and service but not the results.  This happened before we arrived. The local governor said he would be responsible, but guess who is not the local governor any more and surprise, the current one knows nothing about it.  We need to figure out what to do. When we build a water station, we build it and then turn it over to the local government.  They are responsible for it and are suppose to maintain it and keep it running. It is depressing when we go back to check and see how they are working to find out they haven't been maintained.

On Wednesday we went on a 3.5 hour drive (one way) to visit 4 wells in Zuunkharra and to see how well they were serving the people.

Notice the roof, doesn't look very good.

Some of the wells in Zuunkhara were well maintained and being used, while some were not. Need to figure out why.

There was a camel on the side of the road on the way back from Zuunkharra.  It was a friendly fellow.  Here he is with our translator Mugii

This was some of the beautiful scenery on the way to Zuunkharra  It was kind of a misty  rainy day so the colors are hard to see.

Yak grazing.

Herds of goat, sheep and horses.

Harvesting Hay.  These trucks would go down the road and would look like hairy beasts.

Another herd of horses

 One of the fresh water dumpstations that we checked out. It was in a middle of a field instead of being next to a road.  Someone had fenced off the road.  We were surprised that there was not by a bunch of houses or gers.  We don't know why it was built here unless the government had presented that this would be a growing area and would need more water.  It did not look that way.

Our water specialists said that this work can be either very gratifying or very frustrating.

We went on a hike Saturday, probably the last one of the season. It is suppose to snow on Sunday. One species of pine tree here has it's needles turn yellow and fall off. The name of the tree I think is Larch.  Our hike was spectacular, but we were in the shade most of the way, so the pictures do not do the scenery justice.

A cute little black squirrel.  His ears are radical!

Scripture of the week: 1 Nephi 21:10 They shalt not hunger nor thirst, neither shall the heat or the sun smite them; for he that hath mercy on them shall lead them, even by the springs of water shall he guide them.