It’s easy back in the states to take things that seem normal to us for granted. One of those things that I have grown to really appreciate while living in Africa has been water.
Back home water is easily accessed. We also don’t realize how much we use it for, such as washing dishes, showering, flushing toilets, cooking, washing your hands, and doing laundry. This past week I had the opportunity to grow a whole new appreciation for constant running water. From Friday to Thursday the city spontaneously shut the water off. This means that each day we’d wake up in hopes of it being on and had no idea when we would have it again.
We were fortunate enough to have a few buckets of water brought to our house during the day for cooking and washing dishes, but other than that we really did not have much to use besides for occasional hand washes. Yea it was kind of gross, but at the same time, we survived. Each day actually got easier as we learned to simply live with less water. You learn to preserve every little bit of it and to reuse what you can.
What’s even more crazy is that these living conditions, no running water, are not un-normal in Rwanda and really all of Africa. We are lucky that we have running water the few days that we do.
It’s been very eye opening, not just seeing people live with little water access, but actually experiencing it. We are more lucky than we realize at times and it’s been really neat for me to learn more about appreciating the little things that I wouldn’t normally think were a big deal.
So, the point of this is not to make you feel bad if you have constant running water in your home, because that is awesome! But if you think of it, say a little prayer for someone around the world that is most likely walking every day to retrieve their water. In some cases, retrieving water can mean a several mile walk and depending on the families situation, finding time to walk that far multiple times in the day can be very difficult.
Thanks for keeping up with my blogs! I’m trying to get a second one up by Monday about the ministry work we are doing for the month.
God Bless!
