Hello! My name is Keïssa and I live in Mali. Sometimes, I feel as though I was born with a bucket on my head. Ever since I was a little girl, I have drawn water from the well in our village. But not in the last few months because our well has dried up!

I now walk for an hour to get water. I go with my friends and we have a good time, talking the whole way. It is walking back that is difficult because the sun is so hot – I think that it gets hotter when I have the bucket on my head.

There is yet another problem. The water level in the second well seems to be getting lower and lower. One of my friends, whose father is the village chief, told us that soon there would not be any water left in that well, and we will have to walk further – almost two hours – to the next closest well. That scares me because the walk back is already long, and the path to the other well is full of stones. But we have no alternative! It is now time for my second trip to the well today. Sometimes I feel that my bucket is made especially for my head!