Families: 96 + 2 other villages (Chamba + Kapenuka)
Water Committee: 4 men and 6 women

For generations, Tonse Village survived without clean water. The elders say their great-grandparents lived the same way—waking before dawn, walking to the river, and hoping the rains wouldn’t sweep anyone away. Clean water wasn’t just out of reach; it felt impossible. So when the drilling team arrived, the whole village came together and cleared a road in just a few hours, determined to welcome a new beginning.

Before the well, daily life revolved around the struggle for a single bucket of water. Women often left home at three or four in the morning and returned with one bucket around seven. Men bathed at the river, children went to school without bathing, and meals were delayed until water finally arrived. Farming was difficult—without consistent water, crops suffered and families went hungry. Cholera swept through the village year after year, claiming lives and sending families to distant clinics.

Everything changed the moment clean water arrived. Since the borehole was installed, not a single person has fallen sick from cholera. Homes that once felt strained by stress and sickness are now peaceful. Parents say their children wake up, bathe themselves, and head to school clean and confident. Families are eating earlier, farming more easily, and making plans for the rainy season with hope instead of fear. Women speak often about the freedom they feel now that water is close—they can cook, clean, or fetch water whenever they choose, without waking in the dark or sacrificing precious hours of their day.

Kurt Dahlin, reflecting on the transformation, said, “Clean water is better than a clinic.” For the villagers of Tonse, those words are reality: a single well has brought health, opportunity, and peace that touches every household.

One villager put it simply: “We never believed clean water would reach us. Now our children are growing up in a different life.”

Tonse’s first safe water source in history has brought dignity, stability, and a sense of joy that fills the entire community.