Esther’s story

Esther and her 3 children
Image: WaterAid / Ernest Randriarimalala

Every morning Esther straps her baby daughter to her back, and walked for hours through mud to collect dirty water.

“I have to fetch water for my family down the hill at least three times a day,” Esther says bravely.

‘Sitting on the muddy stoop with her children, Esther looks much older than her 29 years’.

“For me it is really tough because I have to fetch water with my young children,” she adds.

When she says she walks “down a hill”, what she means is that she straps her baby girl to her back, and carefully picks her way down a steep, slippery mountainside.

Esther walking with her Children with a Jerry can
Image: WaterAid / Ernest Randriarimalala

When she gets to the bottom, she fills a large container from the contaminated river, and lugs it back up the hill for her children to drink.

“It’s very tiring for me,” she admits, “I often have neck and back pain you know and my children are often sick… They are so weak as we don’t have that much stuff to eat – bellyache and diarrhoea are something that we have to deal with … it is like every day.”

Esther knows that children in her village have died from dirty water. Can you imagine her worry for her own little ones?

There is some good news. If dirty water costs lives, clean water saves them!

You can help mothers like Esther by buying WaterAids Gifts for Life.  

WaterAid’s Gifts for Life are the perfect way to give fantastic, unusual gifts to your family and friends… and help some of the world’s poorest people at the same time!

Gifts for Life, helps keep mothers like Esther and her children safe from deadly diseases found in dirty water and set women and girls free from the burden of collecting it!

Each item is carefully chosen to help fund WaterAid projects that save the lives of children like Esther’s.

And by giving a Gift for Life to friends and family, you’ll help spread the joy all around the world!

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