We believe that true connection to a cause comes with great storytelling that inspires you to do more, give more, and live more. Everyone Forever is more than just achieving continuously flowing water — it’s about creating a better life for families, entrepreneurs, and community members around the world. These are their stories.
“Children and teachers walked from school to a well near our house to get water and carry it back,” said Mayra, who lives with her husband Hector and their two young sons Marcos and Anthony. “They needed water to clean the school, and teachers and students needed it to use the bathroom and wash their hands.”
Annie sits outside of her mud-plastered home, a small thatched canopy providing little respite from the Malawi heat. Her gaze focuses on some scribbled words on the side of her latrine: Tigwiritse Nchito Chimbuzi Moyenera Nthawi Zonse.
Pablo Terceros Vargas is sparking a sanitation revolution in his rural community in Bolivia.
Don Ángel went from being a zoologist who worked with livestock to leading the water and sanitation office in the province of Gran Chimu de Cascas in Peru.
Está muy lejos, they tell us. Thagoni is very far.
Absolut Elyx is on a 5-year mission with Water For People to bring safe water to over 100,000 people worldwide. This spring, Absolut Elyx is bringing back their #RaiseItForward social media campaign so supporters around the world can join in on this mission.
Small in stature but big in heart, Amadeo Rojas will do anything to make sure his community has water.
“We’re very happy,” Bernard says. He and his wife Febronie are happy their two young grandsons don’t have to walk so far to fetch water. They’re happy that the new water point supports the entire village, improving lives for Everyone. A change that will last Forever, through sustainable tariffs that fund operations and maintenance well into the future.
Every day starts with hygiene at Mahendraganj Purba F.P. School in the Sagar Block of India’s South 24 Parganas District.
Students on Sagar Island in West Bengal, India feel a sense of ownership over their school’s water and sanitation facilities.
Dharanidhar Kumar has always been known as “DK” to his friends. But now he has a new nickname – The Toilet Seller.
When Maria Lopez decided to move in with her husband’s family to the rural community of Nueva Esperanza in San Antonio de Cortés, Honduras, the residents there were on the verge of naming it “El Olvido”- the forgotten place. They needed water and weren’t getting the support they needed from the government. They felt neglected and forgotten.
“This business is very important, because we are making the city to be clean.”
Weave through the rolling green hills of Uganda’s countryside, past lines of banana trees, clusters of coffee plants, and a few cattle wandering alongside a narrow dirt path, and you’ll find Aisha Lubega at her local water point, turning water into progress for her entire community.
For the first 30 years of her life, Bijali had to walk for water.
“We collected drinking water from our village pond,” Bijali said. “The monsoon seasons were tough, as I had to walk through a waterlogged, broken path.”
Don Goyo has led the charge for safe water in his rural community in the hilly terrain of Western Guatemala. From a young age, he looked for problems to solve and ways to make life better for Everyone in his community. In many ways, making life better started with water.
Beatrice and her neighbors have an acute understanding of the value of time.
On any given day, as she sees her kids off to school or prepares food for her family, Maureen could get a call from a community in her region. She’d drop everything in that moment, grab her tools, and head off on her bicycle.
Priscilla wanted to work in healthcare her entire life.
“It was a passion and a childhood aspiration,” she says.
The kindergarten in the picturesque town of Nueva Granada, Honduras has reliable water and sanitation services.
“We cannot do anything without water,” Sumati says.
John overcame poverty through poop businesses.
That’s right, you read that correctly.
A lasting approach to sanitation must consider how to create behavior change and local ownership.
Combine baking soda, oil, and extract from a local Malawian tree, and it equals better hygiene for an entire community.
In rural Uganda, Water For People is helping entrepreneurs tackle every part of the sanitation value chain, from constructing latrines and emptying them to transferring and treating fecal waste. In this last step – fecal waste treatment – Water For People is creating a true circular economy by repurposing waste, uncovering its potential value as “brown gold.”
Ten girls are keeping hundreds of girls in school in India.
Without leaders on the ground and in local, district, and national governments championing water services for Everyone Forever, the wells and pumps don’t mean much.
When Jorge Arnez gets an idea in his head, nothing can stop him.
The 216 villages in the Traditional Authority of Chapananga in Chikwawa District in Malawi have been declared open defecation free – a huge milestone for the district, and for Water For People.
“Let’s organize a motorcycle ride to this conference every year, and if we’re going to do that, why don’t we try raising money?”
Toilet giveaways don’t work, because they create a cycle where families don’t view constructing a household toilet as something they could do themselves – or would even be willing to do.
Bhabani, Koyel, and Sumitra may range in height and age, but they share a common purpose: to participate in the Child Cabinet at Chemaguri Natun Free Primary school on an island in Sagar, India. The three girls are leaders in this student government-like group to help promote good hygiene habits among their fellow students and ensure that the water and sanitation systems at their school are clean and maintained.
A typical day for Enelesi meant waking up at four in the morning to fetch water from a nearby community.
Angel, Elizabeth, and Sylvia are a triple force for hygiene promotion at their school in Blantyre, Malawi. The girls are triplets, and they’re all in the school sanitation club.
The air is hot and sticky as the afternoon temperature rises in the town of San Jose del Norte.
Didacienne had five children and no home of her own. Her husband died nearly 25 years ago in the Rwandan genocide, and after that she had few options to provide for her family – they lived with various family members to get by. And without water in their village, life was difficult.
Peter and his five children are waiting on safe water.
Laban spends his days overseeing the local water point as community members fetch water. He is the water seller and caretaker of the local hand pump.
Yanine Gutierrez is young. And a woman. But she was determined that nothing – least of all her age or gender – would stand in the way of her work in an often male-dominated field.
Michael Sagastegui is the president of the water committee in Pampas de San Isidro in the district of Cascas, Peru.
Después de graduarse de la universidad con un título en administración, Alexandra estaba en una encrucijada.
When Don Anacleto came to the community of Frontera in the district of Villa Rivero, Bolivia, the only way his community members could get water was from a hand-dug well at his home. Every day, all his neighbors would have to come to his house to get the water they needed.
Now, all that has changed.
When Mayor Justus speaks, you can see the pride in his eyes and hear the sense of accomplishment in his voice. His dream of safe water and reliable sanitation for Everyone Forever started with some scribbles on a napkin over dinner – a big dream for his entire district of Rulindo and ultimately for his country, Rwanda.
“It’s our job to give back. It’s crazy if we don’t.” -Mark Taylor, Water For People volunteer and Arizona Committee member
Debasis Mondal’s bright orange vest signifies the important role he plays in communities in his region of India. He’s a Jalabandhu – a “Friend of Water.”
High in the mountains of Bolivia, one school has made huge changes in water, hygiene, and sanitation.
Standing at just over five feet tall, Luisa Barahona is a petite tour de force. As the President of El Negrito’s Water Board Association in Honduras, she is on a quest to make sure Everyone across the municipality has access to safe water Forever. Over the past six years we’ve watched Doña Luisa’s influence spread from her neighbors and friends to communities across the region.
Every day at 7 am, Cementi Mendozo opens his grocery store in a local trading center in Chikwawa District, Malawi.
The late afternoon sun starts turning golden as Julia, Daniel, and Maria play in the fields surrounding their home just outside of Asunción, Peru. Their life is simple and sweet, and they like it that way.
“Okay, let me give you an example of why water and sanitation in schools are important.” David’s excitement is palpable.
He’s a member of the Chilomoni Primary School’s Sanitation Club in Blantyre, Malawi, and he’s been on the forefront of heralding important change in water and sanitation for the school’s 1,600 students.
The story of one determined teacher who has changed the future of water for an entire community.
In the small community of Llimbe in Peru, water sources were running dry. The population had grown from 35 to 50 families, and some of the families were using more water than they actually needed. Because of this, if you lived higher on the hillside, you may only have water for an hour a day.
“It was like a dream to us,” says Lilian. She says the people in her community never thought they would have safe water.
Bent over in the hot Ugandan sun, fixing a broken car engine for just a few dollars, Isaac thought back to his rural home district. While life there had been hard, his current life in the dusty, noisy, hot city of Kampala was not what he had imagined. And it was much harder to make money than he had anticipated.
As she carefully tends the buds on her trees and feeds the animals she raises, it’s clear that soft-spoken Carolina Torrico is proud of her work. With bright eyes peeking out from under her flat-brimmed hat, Carolina waters her peach and apple trees and shows off her prized baby rabbits.
Saturnino Días is 50-years-old, but he claims to have more energy than men half his age.
When communities don’t have access to water, children have to spend hours every day fetching water. In many cases this causes them to miss school and miss out on an education that could enable them to have a better future.
Grilled cheese sandwiches are helping bring water to people around the world.
As mayor of the district of San Rafael del Norte in Nicaragua, Doña Norma commands respect. She and her family have a long and respected history in the district, so when Doña Norma speaks up, people listen.
When water arrived at Binaga School in the remote countryside of Rwanda, it gave students the future. It provided the foundation for them to dream.
Doña Raquel lives in the community of Lapalén in the district of Cascas, Peru. In 2009 she and her fellow community members began discussions with the local government in hopes of getting access to drinking water, but with little movement.
Francisco Javier Palacios is creating healthier futures in the district of San Rafael del Norte, Nicaragua by changing the way people think about sanitation.
After graduating college with a degree in administration, Alexandra was at a crossroads.
For Celia and her family in the Villa Rivero District of Bolivia, life has gotten easier in the past year.
“Since I was born, I used contaminated well water,” says Celia. “Now, we have access to safe water all the time – for cooking, bathing, and cleaning. Everything has improved.”
In 2009, Hurricane Aila hit West Bengal, India with force, destroying homes with devastating amounts of flooding. In the Water For People district of Pratharpratima, the tiny island of Brajaballabpur was hit hard – and the hurricane took down sanitation infrastructure with it.
Both Maribel and David are dreaming of going to university next year.
Mayor Dunia Rojas is a force to be reckoned with.
The community of Pachoj in Guatemala is 15 miles from the nearest town and challenging to get to – in the rainy season the trek to this tiny town can include more than a mile of walking along muddy roads that often become unpassable for cars. Because access to the town is so difficult, Pachoj lacks basic services like drinking water, sanitation, and electricity.
The recognition of Digambarpur gram panchayat as the best in the country is the result of exemplary leadership, and the determination of the people of Digambarpur to be a part of something bigger – something extraordinary.
Folomina’s face lights up when she talks about her toilet.
Despite the energy in her voice, the lines on Faith’s face and clouded eyes behind her glasses betray her age. At 85, she is living what they call the “bonus years” in Uganda, meaning she is alive to see her great grandchildren. But nothing – least of all her age – is stopping Faith from securing a better future for her family, starting with water.
“We faced a huge struggle for water,” says Shaheli Giri, recalling life just a couple years ago. “During the monsoon season, I had to walk through a muddy path to fetch water from the old hand pump.”
At Water For People, we pay careful attention to the numbers behind our work – because data shows us the impact and illuminates our next steps.
Water For People is honored to have the support of people committing to extraordinary things on behalf of our mission of sustainable water and sanitation for all. Crowdfunders, Committee volunteers, and donors power our critical work to bring sustainable water and sanitation services to millions of people in the nine countries where we work.
“My school uniform had lost its original color,” recalls 13-year-old Martin.
For water services to be sustainable, local leadership is key. Without it, communities like Ntayba in Rulindo District, Rwanda wouldn’t be able to count on water that would flow for generations to come.
High in Peru’s Andes Mountains, Maria Montalvo Arce grows grapes.
On the road to reaching Everyone Forever in the districts where we work, Water For People has defined different milestones to celebrate along the way – reaching every community, clinic, school, and family with reliable water services. We are thrilled that in 2016, we had three districts reach every community and two districts reach every clinic and school!
What do you do when the school where you’ve devoted your entire life has its source of water cut off, and your students are left to fend for themselves?
For most of us, the idea that water could keep us from going to school, doing our job, and providing for our families is a strange one — even impossible. But for millions of women and girls around the world, that scenario is a day-to-day reality.
Women + Girls
We’re committed to bringing an end to extreme poverty in our lifetime. From universal access to safe water and sanitation to the partnerships that will make it all possible, we are proud to be part of the progress.
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