The arrival of indoor plumbing in an Alaska village is a godsend for residents who can now turn on a tap for their drinking water or start a machine to do their laundry.
Joseph Moses, left, and and Thomas Noatak attach a honey bucket to an ATV before traveling to the village landfill, Friday, Aug. 18, 2023, in Akiachak, Alaska. Joseph and Thomas collect and remove garbage and human waste from village streets each morning. – Sanitation workers Thomas Noatak and Joseph Moses start every workday riding a four-wheeler along the muddy roads of this small Yup’ik village on southwestern Alaska’s vast Kuskokwim River, looking for human waste.
All that's changing in Akiachak, where most of the village's nearly 700 people began getting modern plumbing for the first time this spring and summer — and finding their lives transformed. It's not just an inconvenience. It's a health issue, with higher rates of respiratory illnesses and skin infections like impetigo and boils where plumbing doesn't exist.
Before getting running water, those residents had to haul water from the river or laundry to their home or collect rainwater. Honey buckets aren't gone entirely. Living in Alaska is expensive — a pound of black pepper costs $34 and a can of corned beef hash is $11, for example — so some residents are unwilling or unable to pay the $100 monthly cost for the water service.
Mary Lou Beaver grew up in Akiachak, packing water from the river as a girl, collecting rainwater and using an outhouse. Now retired from teaching and living in Anchorage, Beaver — who was visiting her old village to help relatives after a death — is glad that those memories will become relics of the past.“Why did it take so long?” she asked.
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Water hookups come to Alaska Yup'ik village, and residents are thrilled to ditch their honey bucketsThe arrival of indoor plumbing in an Alaska village is a godsend for residents who can now turn on a tap for their drinking water or start a machine to do their laundry
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