Fairer Faucet

“We all need the waters of the Mercy River. Though they don't run deep, there's usually enough, just enough, for the extravagance of our lives.”

-Unattributed (if you know the source please let me know)

The end of the school year is fast approaching and my students are getting ready for their big day, preparing for what's known in IB schools as the PYP exhibition. In their last year of the primary program the students are required to stage what amounts to a science fair for social studies.

One of my groups is studying finite resources, specifically water, so they arranged to visit a water treatment plant. There are no rivers or lakes on the island so all the water used here is collected in man made reservoirs. We do occasionally run out of water though, thankfully, it's never lasted more than two days.

At the end of our tour our guide mentioned to my students that they had a tap on site from which you could actually drink the water. The excitement this generated made it difficult for me not to laugh. I know there's nothing funny about not having access to safe drinking water from a tap, but it was the way we all gathered around this tap, a faucet paparazzi with cameras flashing, video rolling, that struck me as absurd.

None of the kids had their water bottles with them but they insisted I try it. So I gamely put some in my bottle and they all watched expectantly while I took a swig. It was nasty. Like drinking stale bleach with a bit of dirt thrown in. But what can a girl who's so blessed as to come from a country where almost all taps produce safe drinkable water (even if most people do refuse to drink it in favour of bottled water) say except, "Mmmm, that's very good"?

Later that afternoon I had some pretty severe stomach cramps but I kept that where I kept my opinon. To myself.