Manas airbase personel keep water, goodwill flowing

[Nemesis6]

12/7/2007 - MANAS AB, KYRGYZSTAN -- "We would have to walk to get water in a bucket."
These were the words of Ivan Lozhechnivkov, an elderly resident who has lived in the Oktyabrskoye Village near Manas Air Base since 1954.
Bundled up against the cold, the 82-year old resident was not reminiscing about old times in the village, he was talking about their current situation.
"So thank you," he said.
His words were spoken to Manas Airmen Nov. 29, for providing the funds to help bring running water back to his part of the village.

He was one of about 25 villagers who came out that afternoon to see a check for 20,000 com presented to Galina Tereschuk, the mayor of the village.
She had been working with the water company and the electric company for the past several weeks to figure out what was causing a portion of the village to be without water in their homes.
The root cause was one of the village's three water pumps, which was repeatedly failing. Each time they would think they had the problem fixed; it would break again.
"For one month it failed four times," said Ms. Tereschuk, "and many people were without a constant water supply."
Finally it was determined that they needed to not only repair the pump, but also move the transformer providing the power to the pump from where it is now to a better location.
But the problem was the three previous "fixes" had cost money and the village couldn't spare any more money on this additional unplanned expense.

Ms. Tereschuk coordinated with her Village Partnership representatives at the base, the 376th Expeditionary Security Forces Squadron and the 376th Expeditionary Communication Squadron.
They presented a check shortly thereafter, once they were able to get funding approved through the Manas Service Organization. The MSO is the private organization that raises funds and distributes it to the Village Partnership Program. The six villages around the base are paired up with squadrons. Volunteers work with the village mayors and spend their limited off-duty time cleaning up or renovating community areas or, in this case, working the mayor's other priorities.

"This was the mayor's number one priority," said Senior Master Sgt. Paul Dubay, 376th ESFS. "And so we were glad that we could take care of it for the village."
The ESFS and ECS have teamed up on a number of projects in the village. They recently cleaned up the World War II memorial and finished building an outhouse for the village kindergarten class. Next they hope to do some maintenance on the playground equipment which was built by other Manas Airmen several rotations ago.
"We are so pleased. I told the villagers we have American friends who are helping," said Ms. Tereschuk. "People in the village didn't believe me at first, but today they had a chance to see it."

http://www.manas.afnews.af.mil/news/story.asp?id=123078709

It might be a bit of an obscure piece of news if you don't know the context - Manas airbase is an airport in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan. American and other forces have been operating from there since some time after 2001. Apparently those guys have been doing a bit more than refuelling military aircraft there. I've posted about them before:

U.S Airmen building homes in... Kyrgyzstan? -
http://www.halflife2.net/forums/showthread.php?t=135554

 

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