Jacob’s Well Founder

Joan Roose – This is Her Story

In January 2004 my life changed. Listen to Joan's life journey, through her favourite music, as a guest on 3MBS Tropic Island Discs.

I went with a team to India where we travelled in the states of Orissa and Andhra Pradesh. One day we were with some health workers visiting several tribal villages in Orissa. In one village I was given a tiny baby to nurse. She was so small and weak I thought she was only a few days old. I was shattered when I discovered she was nine weeks old, the same age as my granddaughter, but half her size and weight. The baby had a mouth full of thrush, so much that it looked like she had teeth; she was also very jaundiced. She had no muscle condition, no strength; apparently this is very common as the mothers are in such poor health, malnourished and therefore lacking milk, generally not enough often to sustain life.

I asked the local doctor who was showing us around the area whether he could give the baby some drops to clear up the thrush. His response was that the mother doesn't wash, so the baby would just get reinfected. I asked why the health workers couldn't teach her to wash; his response there was no water for her to wash with. I then pointed to a borewell about 30 meters away and said ‘but there's a well just over there.’

The doctor told me that it was on High Caste ground and as most of the people in the village were lower caste, they could not walk on that ground, let alone touch or use the well. The only water they could use was run off from the bore well or they could collect water from a nearby stagnant pond.

I wondered why there also wasn’t a lower-caste well. I was told it would cost (then) Rs 50,000 to sink a well and, as they work as day labourers, the village would never be able to afford one.

This is the story in thousands of villages in the mountainous hill country of Orissa and in many other states of India and other countries.

Undeterred I asked if I went home and raised enough for a bore well would he help me. His response was where do you start?

I returned to Australia with a burning passion to help. I wanted to raise the money needed to sink a well and provide clean, fresh water for the villagers. And so, after a lot of talking, planning, research and prayer, 12 months later, Jacob's Well India began.

Since then, we have partnered with local Indian people who share the same vision. Jacob’s Well has grown and developed.