What do these two have in common? Freewaters is a footwear company that just launched in California, debuting 10 mens and 7 women’s sandals. Their shoes are innovative sandals and flipflops stylishly designed with ergonomic support, creating a very high-tech, comfy place for your feet. Why do I care? Because I’m one of their women’s product samples and have 4 shiny new pairs of freewaters flipflops that Im going to wear and tear in my upcoming travels.

women's sandals Sola, Vezpa, Capetown and Bossa Nova

I’m pretty excited about this after my recent trip to India, because when I was there I had the perpetual problem of my shoes breaking. The flipflops I wore there were only a few months old (Hawaianas), but since I walk so much when I travel, one broke after the first day on India’s less-than-navigable sidewalks. I then bought a pair of flipflops for 100 rupees ($2.25), which broke the following day on a hike around Hampi’s Hindi temple ruins, and I realized very quickly that Indian-made sandals are far from duarble; throughout the rest of my barefoot walk home, I probably saw 10 odd sided, broken shoes scattered along the trail. Luckily I managed to find one functional right-sided shoe, and a few meters later, the broken left sided one which I fixed and had another pair of sandals… which broke the next day.

I doubt these Freewaters sandals will give me any trouble, and in fact, I may have a hard time even wearing them out since they’re so well made. But, the best part about these shoes isn’t that they look great or are super comfy to wear, but the mission behind the product: Freewaters is trying to design the best sandals while finding solutions to the global drinking water pandemic. Their first humanitarian initiative is a project in Dago, Kenya, where they are digging a series of freshwater wells to provide safe and reliable drinking water in an area of the world where water-borne disease is a serious problem. For every pair of Freewaters sandals one buys, it allows them to provide clean drinking water for one person for one year. Since March 22nd is World Water Day, perhaps now is a good time to get involved.

For more information, to see how you can help, or to buy your own pair of sandals, check out www. freewaters.com.

For more information on the grassroots organization implementing the Freewaters direct cause initiative, go to http://www.ProjectFreewaters.org.