Melam, jeeo, H2O- WATER

New place in the city officially procured. I get to move in in a few days. There are so many things to be excited about: electricity, privacy, meeting new neighbors, a market near my house, and indoor plumbing to name a few. And how excited I am about these things makes me think maybe I should blog a bit about basic needs here and how for so many Gambians, satisfying those needs is different than for most people who will read this.

One of the most basic needs is water, so I'll blog about that one first.

Probably most of you have heard something from a charity in the US about water in Africa- how hard it is to get, how clean water is hard to come by,etc.
Here in The Gambia, we're pretty lucky with water. The country is based around a body of water- The River Gambia, so our water table is higher than a lot of places.  This makes wells easier and cheaper to dig. In Foni, where I was posted before, our water table was about 5-10 meters (way more shallow than the national average).  That means that in my area when you needed water, you either threw a bucket on a 15-30 foot rope down into a hole to pull up water or you went to the pump and pumped the water up. In some places, there are mechanized pumps run by solar or generator that put water in tanks that can then be gotten out of taps- like the hose pipe on the side of your house. Only with a tap or a pump, and often with a well for that matter, the water is shared between a lot of people. This gets a lot worse in the urban areas or in big villages where people have to stand in line for their turn for water or even plan their days around the time when the tap is open for use.
Clean water is aonther issue. There are 2 kinds of wells- open and covered. Their names say it all. Covered wells are covered with a concrete lid and a pump brings the water to the surface. This water is usually pretty clean and safe to drink. Open wells are open to the elements. They are just a deep hole in the ground. Anything can fall in there. Anything can grow in there. Its very easy for this kind of well to become contaminated. Covered wells are far superior, but also far more expensive and more liable to break. When the rope on your bucket breaks, pretty much any idiot can fix that. Tie a knot or get a new rope. When something inside a pump for a covered well breaks, only a trained professional can fix it. That takes money and the guy also has to show up to fix it. My village was without a covered well for about 3 months during my stay once because of a pump failure, and they did a commendable job of getting it back up and running quickly and efficiently. Some pumps sit months or years waiting to be fixed.  And during this time, everyone around is drinking questionable water.  In many villages, there are only open wells and only ever have been.

Think of all the things in your life that use water. Cooking, washing dishes, washing hands, showering, drinking, watering plants, pets drinking water, washing clothes, etc... Imagine if you had to go get that instead of it just coming into your house. Its not convenient.  Thus why indoor plumbing is on my list of things to be excited about for city life.