Water

So I know that I often will write or tell people about water when talking about my Peace Corps experiences.  I can safely say, I am so much more aware of water.  I think I’ve solved the problem of how people can be more conscious of their water use: make every person carry the water they use.  THAT will most certainly raise your awareness of exactly how much water you need to flush the toilet, or wet your toothbrush, or use to wash your face.

            I’m quite whiney when it comes to water.  In my village, we don’t have any spigots or wells.  We have natural springs, which are not deep enough to put your whole bucket in.  Rather, we get to use little cups to scoop the water out and into our buckets.  There’s apparently a proper way to do this, and I have yet to get it right.  I don’t really get many opportunities, though, as kids swarm me every time I go to the springs, and will fill my bucket for me.  They let me carry the bucket by myself, but if there are kiddos around, they will undoubtedly scoop the water for me.  When it comes to actually carrying water, I’m a wuss compared to the mamas and kids.  I carry the small buckets, which are 10 liters (according to my phone converter, that’s 2.64 gallons in the U.S.).  Many of my students and the mamas around the village can carry 20 liter buckets on their head with no problem and no hands.  I, however, don’t have the neck muscles/abilities that they’ve been accumulating their entire lives (little kids who are anywhere between 2 and 5 will balance little 1 or 2 liter jugs on their heads, honing in on those awesome head-balancing skills I have yet to master), so I stick with my 10 liter buckets.  But, as I wear glasses, it’s kind of a pain in the butt when I’m walking along the varied trails around my village.  With a bucket on my head, I can’t exactly lower my head to look down at my feet.  I look down, but my peripheral vision is blurred, because of the angle my head stays at.  So there have been a few times that I’ve stumbled because I haven’t been able to see properly, and everyone seems worried that they’ve broken Madam (I’ve NEVER seen a Tanzanian stumble while carrying stuff on their head).

            Once I get the water back to my house, it’s valued, treasured, and used as many times as I possibly can.  I have recently become kind of obsessed with my personal water conservation.  Considering that the springs close to my house have kind of dried up at this time of year, I have to go farther when I get water, to a spring that is down in a valley.  The last few times, it’s been over an hour trip total, mostly because the return trip is very uphill, carrying a full bucket.  One time though, I saw a family of monkeys when I came back!  That was exciting.

            Back to the matter at hand…I wash my face every morning and night, but otherwise…I’ve become pretty lax in how often I bathe.  I have a good supply of baby wipes on hand, but recently I bathe/wash my hair only once a week or so.  Bucket baths make me much more conscious of how much water I use, for sure, and lately I’ve been bathing while standing in a bigger basin, so I can catch the water.  That water then goes to be my toilet water.  When I’m REALLY desperate (as I have been this past week), the water I wash my face with will then be used to wash my clothes, then to wash my dishes, and finally added to the toilet water.  I have a feeling a few of you are quite disgusted at the moment, but when you have only a few buckets worth of water, you reuse it as you’d never expect you’d have to.

            I recently bought a pretty big water drum to store water in.  It can hold 120 liters.  I’ve only had it full once so far, but that amount of water was able to tide me over for 3 weeks.  Apparently the average American uses that amount in one day through the various things that use water (dish washer, washing machine, toilet, showering, etc).  I’m not telling you that you need to change your lifestyle, as it’s not in my place, nor would it work.  However, just think a wee bit when you brush your teeth.  Maybe turn off the water and think about how excited your favorite PCV would be to have that extra bit of water.

*I wrote this back in September but have been silly and not posted it.  Since I originally wrote it, we’ve been in the short rainy season, during which my village has had TOO much water.  I’m not complaining, but walking anywhere has become a very muddy affair, I’ve filled every bucket and both water drums and wished I had more to fill, and the school 2000-liter water tank is full.  Let’s hope the next few weeks/months will be a pretty good time as far as having water goes*