Meet Amina

"Hello! I'm Amina"

Hi! My name is Amina. I am 11 and I live in a small village called Kuluunda, in Malawi, which is in Africa.

I have three younger sisters and a new baby brother. We live together with mum, dad and our grandmother.

WaterAid and its local partner have been working in my village for nearly a year, and we now have a handpump really close to our home. The whole village has been involved in the project. Now we are beginning to build toilets to help keep the place clean and healthy.

Your community could work together too, by raising money for WaterAid to do more projects like the one in my village.

School

I love going to school. Before WaterAid started working in our village, me and my friends didn't go to school much because we spent so much time walking to collect water. Sometimes we were too ill to go to school because the water was not safe to drink and we didn't have enough toilets to keep the place safe.

Now I can go to school every day because the water is close to our house. At the moment we are learning songs about hygiene and how important it is to wash your hands and keep the toilets clean. Click here to listen to songs like the ones I've been learning!

Health

Me and my friends are often ill because of the dirty water and toilets.

In countries like Malawi each child has an average of ten attacks of diarrhoea before the age of five and many die.

Daily routine

If you think you have to get up early for school then spare a thought for me!

I get up at 5am and walk to the water hole, which is 10 km away. It gets very hot. Then I help with the housework and cooking.

Before it gets dark I play with my friends. We make up stories and act them out for our families.