Water ...

You might have seen Alisha’s recent blog about the things we take for granted … things that so many people do not have the luxury of enjoying: water and electricity being pretty basic (and we can’t forget food and shelter).


Well – this is something I often struggle with. I truly do live in a palace compared to the people we serve. I have walls, a roof, a floor, a private bathroom and I never worry about my next meal. And I have water. If not running – at the very least it is in my pila for the 90% of the time (literally) that the water does not fun through the pipes.

So this morning – I had a treat. Something I have not had in my bathroom since I’ve been here (as interim in 2007/8 and as permanent co-worker since January of 2009). I had a hot shower.

My shower has been ‘repaired’ several times – but the repairs never took. It took someone who knew what the real problem was and then who knew how to fix it. Thank you Andres! He had to hook the shower head up to a separate circuit breaker – and one more powerful that the one that was there. Prior to this addition, everything was hooked up to one relatively weak circuit breaker – so my lights would dim when I turned on the shower and at best I would get tepid water; just enough ‘warmth’ to take the freezing edge off. So like Alisha – I usually didn’t bother with the actual shower, but preferred the control of the bucket shower. Brrrr.  I also have a 'flash water heater' meant for heating water for tea - bet the original inventor of this lovely device didn't know it would be appreciated for other uses!

So now I not only have water running every other day. But now I have HOT water.

And along with it the guilt.

I’ve been told I shouldn’t feel guilty because I have these luxuries. But I can’t help it.