Water

Several events converged in the past two weeks that have given me a new perspective on access to clean water. In chronological order:

1. The water purifier in my apartment broke.
2. A day of manufacturing visits left me pretty dehydrated in semi-arid Ahmedabad. I turned even whiter than usual and laid on the floor for an evening, groaning while Cynthia (Wello's founder) forced water on me like a nanny bearing cod liver oil.
3. I finally succumbed to digestive distress and required constant rehydration for several days.
4. A construction project began in my building, and the beloved tap water has become intermittent at best, sporadic and unpredictable and often nonexistent at worst.  

I became a water hoarder. I started boiling water by the potful and decanting into various containers, stowing them around the house. I learned to keep the lids on lest an errant pigeon feather float through the window and sully my hard work. I experimented with iodine, iodine + flavor enhancers, and finally took my SteriPen out of its original packaging. I found that unadulterated Bombay tap water tastes like Lake Huron. 

I've learned to yell paani nahim (no water!) in frustration. Laundry piles up, as does the fine layer of filth on my skin. I've started leaving buckets underneath open taps, to immediately, urgently gather water whenever it becomes suddenly available. I'm working on engineering a rainwater collection method from a 4th-floor window, but haven't yet perfected it...

For me, this annoyance is temporary. I'm leaving India in 10 days. I'll head back West, drink directly from a reliable tap. But compared with the people Wello aims to serve, my situation in Bombay is luxurious. I'm not walking several kilometers several times a day to fill several 20-liter steel mattkas from a pond shared by dogs and goats. I'm not carrying that weight home on my head. I'm not filtering the mattka contents through a cloth and serving the results to my family. I'm not waiting anxiously for the rains so the pond will refill. The fear of the late monsoon does not hover, desperate and constant, in the back of my mind.

These are the realities of life all over rural India. During field visits in Rajasthan, we spoke with hundreds of people whose daily routines revolve around when and where water will come. If Wello can help make those answers a little more predictable, they can devote some of that time and energy elsewhere.