Water Crisis

Wednesday afternoon, the water crisis started.  I had just finished drinking my second liter of water of the day (you need to stay hydrated down here) when I checked my email.  What I found made my stomach churn. A lovely (please note the sarcasm) email saying that the water was no longer potable and had been that way since the morning.  This meant that I had just drunk 2 liters of water that was contaminated by who knows what.

For the rest of the night, we got subsequent emails giving us further information about the water.  We received one email which said "do not come in contact with contaminated water under any circumstance." At this point in time, hypochondriac mode took over. I made the mistake of looking up all of the water-borne illnesses. I kept thinking that I was now infested with a parasite, or heavy metal or some other super nasty thing that has been incubating in the volcanic soil of Dominica.  Thankfully there were no actual symptoms of drinking bad water.

I hit the 24 hour mark and still no symptoms.  (Thank you for prophylactic antibiotics!  Kept my stomach all nice and happy).  On Thursday morning, I was at the IGA when it opened and bought two cases of water. I think I bought some of the last cases they had.   We received an email Thursday afternoon, which stated that after testing, the water was safe to shower in and that boiling made it safe to wash dishes with.  I have to say that boiling water for dishes is an extremely annoying, tedious process.  It made the relatively simple task of hand-washing dishes that much worse.  (Boiling the amount of water needed to wash a sink full of dishes took around an hour.)  I have a new-found appreciation for the settlers of the west and people who have to do this on a daily basis.

Now it is Friday and still no solution to the water crisis.  I talked to my maid this morning and she was upset about the situation as well.  She said that her daughters didn't have water at school and that she didn't have the extra money to buy them bottles to take with them.  I ended up giving her two of my bottles so that she would have water for her kids on Monday.   My school has provided a free ration of water for the Ross community. (We each get a 1.5L bottle and a .5L bottle).  

Truck being unloaded.  

One of the trucks with all the empty boxes. 

My 2L of water!  Now I can say I waited in line to get my rations. 

UPDATE--As soon as I got back from picking up my water, I received an email saying our water is clear to drink.  YAY!! However, I still think that I am going to drink bottled water for the weekend until the bad water runs through the system.