DIY Biosand Filters

I was thinking that I should write about something that happens in the day to day of life, and not wait for big trips to the field. I could write about having to walk with zombie arms when going upstairs to the roof to bring in my dry laundry so that I don’t get spider webs in my face. (Of course, I still get them on my hands, but that is slightly preferable.) But that just took one sentence. I could write about sitting in the office and becoming irrationally angry at flies that buzz around my head, but that story is not very exciting and it involves a lot of swearing, and my mother wants me to pretend on this blog that I never do that. Fortunately, we embarked on the great biosand filter adventure recently, and it has given me an epic saga to narrate.

Biosand filters are tall-ish cement boxes that use biological and mechanical means to filter water. They can be made from locally available materials. They do not require replacement parts and they can last for around 50 years, serving about 10 people. A water engineer friend of mine once told me that she really hated them because she thinks they are overrated and don’t work as well as foreign practitioners (i.e. me on behalf of my orgs) give the impression that they do. I finally wore her down to this important question: “Ok, are they are least better than drinking water straight out of the river?” She admitted that they are. So that’s good enough for me. Also, I’ve drunk water from biosand filters and I’m still alive. Of course, I’ve also drunk water from the tap in Cairo, Egypt and I’m still alive, so I’m probably also giving a false impression of how relevant my ability to drink biosand filter water is to its actual level of purity. However, I do always feel the need to point out the fact that I may be overselling this filter, even as I really believe that it is a good and helpful tool, preferable to nearly every other water purification method I’ve seen in the field in the 3 countries where I’ve lived in Africa. (In Asia, it’s a different story that I won’t get into here, but if you really want to know, ask in the comments or send me an email—don’t worry, I’m not holding my breath. Though I do love discussing household water treatment options...)

In light of tenuous situations in South Sudan and Sudan, and in light of the fact that I elected to live in Chad to help IAS out and give me an excuse to be in a new language and new country, I’ve been trying to get a biosand filter project started here in Chad since last year. There have been many ups and downs, but finally I thought I had found a solution to my need to have a French-speaking trainer help us out. But I should have known better than to choose a Canadian. I forgot that they are trying to ruin my life, while I was appreciating their dedication to bilingual education. At the last minute, with many polite regrets, they backed out of the deal to come and train my guys. I explored various other options, and then decided, à la “The Little Red Hen” (a classic tale you should all be familiar with), that I would do it my own damn  dang self.

I recruited Herve and Kandos, two of my colleagues from IAS, who are always up for learning something new. Herve printed out the French manual, made it into a proper book, and read it cover-to-cover. Kandos also read it in detail, peppering me with questions I made up answers to for several days. I printed out the relevant parts of the English manual for me because I’m lazy and my spelling has gotten really bad since I’ve started reading in French. I skimmed through it, eyes glazing over whenever it detailed size of various gravel particles or specific fancy tools I was pretty sure we would not have.  My level of dedication clearly did not rival that of my colleagues.

How adorable is Kandos in this photo? He will hate
that I said that. He will also hate that I have this photo of him because
he doesn't like people to take his photo, but Herve took this one.
It doesn't matter because he is not on social media anyway.
Kandos is an awesome Congolese/Swedish logistics guy who knows everything.
He is essential to the well-being of my life in Chad.

This photo is a  great representation of Herve.
He loves photos, social media, and joking around.
He is also crucial to the success of everything I do here.
Note: I do not know why he and Kandos dressed up for
going to the welders. As you can see from the photos, I certainly did not.
Also, please excuse the multiple photos of me coming up--
Herve took them all. 

Djibrine in the white robe, laughing
at something I'm saying to the welder
(who is also laughing at me).

Finally the mold was done. In order to get this mold made, I’d watched youtube videos, translating into a mix of French and Arabic for the welder to understand. I also printed out the French manual for him. The mold looked good to me, but I wanted to try to build a filter in it before building a second mold that we would need for the project.  So Herve, Kandos and I went over to the welder’s to try it out.

An important note for this story: Djibrine is our local go-to guy. He is the guy who knows how to get things done. If I need anything I call him and he produces the required object or person or vehicle. He is amazing. When Mary Françoise sawed my lock off and we couldn’t fix it for twodays, I called Djibrine. He came over with a “friend” who fixed it in 10 minutes. When I scraped Naomi’s car backing out of her driveway, he found someone who matched the paint and fixed every other little spot on the car, even the ones that weren’t my fault. Djibrine is also the guy who found the welder who made the filter. And Djibrine is the guy we gave our list of ingredients to so we could make this filter.

Very accurate shot of me with my mouth open,
saying something that no one is listening to.

Once we got to the welders, Herve and Kandos seemed at a loss about where to start. This was disappointing to me, as I had counted on their gung-ho attitude to make this happen with minimal effort on my part. But I had to put in maximal effort instead. After a few minutes of wandering around listlessly, observing the welders in their daily work, I took charge with my English manual and a shovel. I started ordering people around and opening bags of sand and gravel brought in by Djibrine. As soon as people saw the white woman digging in the dirt, their chivalry was activated and they kept trying to grab the shovel away from me. But at this point, I was already into it and didn’t want to give up the shovel. (I really love manual labor, actually.)

We sifted sand and gravel using filters that weren’t exactly the right size, but I decided would work because we were already started and it was too late to change now. Since this bit is for the body of the filter and not for the actual interior filtration, it didn’t matter that much.

We scrubbed and oiled the mold with peanut oil—must be ‘edible oil,’ specified the manual.

Good times with a cold beer and a biosand filter mold.
Kidding. The peanut oil is in the green bottle.

See how shiny it looks? But the shea oil was so much thicker.

We measured liters of cement, sand, and gravel in a piece of plastic cut off from a water bottle that we were told was equal to one liter. It’s possible that it was. It’s also possible that I burned my hand a little on the cement because if everyone else could pick it up with their bare hands, I felt I could as well. I was right only because Chadian chivalry is not dead (at least in matters of construction work) and two men ran over to snatch the measuring cup from my hands and pour water and oil all over me so that I wouldn’t burn.

You can see the very accurate plastic 1 liter measure in my hand.
And my wallet that is sticking out of my pocket in case I needed to
buy other supplies, i.e. peanut oil.

It takes water to make water, as the saying goes.

OK-that wasn't the saying. But it does take water to make cement.

I was very doubtful here as to the consistency of the cement.
The manual was very specific about it.

Then we readied the mold—screwing it together and taping the plastic tube on the top. It was not easy, as the man helping me to oil the mold did not listen when I screamed at him “Non, la, no!” and oiled it anyway. Once oil is on metal, no amount of tissues will make tape be able to stick on it.

My face telling Kandos that the reason the tape wasn't
sticking was because no one listened to me
when I yelled, "Don't oil that!"

It worked somehow.

The little boys who hang around the welders were very interested.
Red shirt boy helped me explain the "high five" to the grown-ups.

Then we shoveled in the cement mixture and tamped it down with a long metal bar.

Action shot!

Look at my muscles!

Seriously, I'm so strong, and Herve took a million of these photos.

Why do you think he took this photo, though?

I like this sunset photo of us all working hard to finish before Maghrib.

Then we waited nearly 24 hours and went back to bust it out of the mold.

Everyone posing except for Kandos.
He's so stubborn.

Then I bragged about how awesome we are on Facebook. And people ate it up. And that made me concerned about how I present myself to the social media world, and I had some deep philosophical discussions with myself about my calculated image as someone who is always doing exciting things, but really there is no point in posting photos of me sitting at my desk writing emails and or collapsed on the couch after a hard day at work sitting at my desk writing emails. Anyway, I’m not that awesome, but when I have awesome moments, I’ll share them with the world, giving the world a skewed perspective on the level of awesome in my life.

I'm so awesome!
(Once in a while)

Then I worried that we wouldn’t actually be able to get the filter out of the mold after I’d bragged about us.

Reality sets in.

And it turns out I worried for good reason. Our first filter came out looking like this:

We had to smash it off the mold, which was actually kind of fun.

Oops.

In hind sight, I can see several things that we did wrong. First, me badly reading the instructions and allowing people to loosen the wrong bolts on the mold first. Second, peanut oil dries fast, and we should have used a different type of oil—we used shea oil on our second attempt (spoiler alert: it worked). Lastly, the extractor wasn’t made correctly. I discovered this while looking closely at the photo in the now-grease-covered print out. Unfortunately, when I told people that the bolt that was welded to the square on top was not supposed to be welded there, they ignored me. Everyone, including the wonderful Kandos, disagreed with my request to un-weld that bolt. They refused to believe that white woman would know anything that they didn’t know about building molds. In their defense, they were basically right. As a general rule, welding and construction (as well as crafts and creative projects) are beyond my skill set. But I can read and follow instructions. Now, usually I don’t. I almost never follow a recipe when I’m cooking. I find them restrictive and dictatorial. But when embarking on a project that I do not understand, I follow the damn dang instructions. I don’t think beyond that, trying to find better ways to make something, though I'm willing to cut corners as use 6mm gravel instead of 5mm gravel. Seriously, who is measuring? And finally, after several failed attempts, and much yelling over loud metal projects happening in the general vicinity (metal work is full of loud painful noises and I forgot to bring my ear plugs every time I went there) in French, Arabic and English (to relieve my feelings) the men agreed to listen to me. And wonder of wonders: my idea (taken from the manual) worked. But at that point, all the welding and banging and peanut oil and lose screws meant that our filter was doomed.

Five men who are all patiently ignoring me.
OK, fine-six. Let's be honest: that guy in the back who is not
doing anything was also ignoring me.

Unwelding and then re-welding.

Never fear, though, dear friends—Take 2 was a success! And not just because people suddenly started listening to me, but mostly because of that.

Yup. My way worked. Did I rub it in their faces?
Oh, absolutely.

Next phase: moving the filter to our office and putting the sand and gravel layers in it to make the actual filter part. I foresee many more good times, epic Facebook posts, and lots of multi-lingual yelling.

My level of confidence in Take 2 is reflected in my facial expression here.

It came out!

A look inside.

Timing the flow rate.

Group success photo!