Sixteen-year-old Chantal Nyembo, who lives in the Democratic Republic of Congo and dreams of being a teacher one day, knows exactly how important clean water is. For most of her life, the only source of water in her village was an old polluted well.

Chantal noticed that she was always tired and that drinking water from the well made her stomach upset and caused her skin to swell. But she had no choice since drinking from the nearby river would have been just as bad. So she kept on drinking it and kept on getting sick.

This problem also affected Chantal’s family. Her parents and seven brothers and sisters often got sick as well. In fact, many people in Chantal’s community became sick because of the contaminated water. Some of them contracted deadly illnesses such as cholera, dysentery and malaria.

But last year, a group of Canadians gave money to World Vision to improve sixty old wells and dig five new ones in the Congo. Chantal’s community received one of the new wells.

Now, instead of an old well with a dusty, metal cover that allowed dirt to fall into the water, the people in Chantal’s community have a new well built on a cement platform and instead of a dirty old rope to lower the pail into the well, they have a pulley system to lift the water out.

Chantal makes seven trips a day to the new well, to pull twenty litres of water out for her and her family. But she doesn’t mind, because she knows the water is clean and safe to drink.

Now that Chantal is healthy she can focus on her dream of becoming a teacher.