Village 'Live-in' - 13 years late! - more lessons from African life!

When we first arrived in Botswana, we were supposed to do what was called a 'village live-in' - a period of time spent living in a village living with the bare basics only.  The idea was to devote time to get to know the culture and language and experience first-hand the dynamics and difficulties of living in a village setting - not least in relation to lack of 'mod-cons' such as electricity and plumbing!

Well, we didn't ever do a 'village live-in' although we were all set to do so.  Just a few days before we were meant to go to the village for 6 months, Andrew fell and dislocated and broke his elbow and then required 6 months of regular physiotherapy to get his arm functioning again!  That meant we stayed in the city.  Well, since all our ministry has been urban based anyhow, it didn't end up being a problem.

But here we are 13 years later, and we are now living in a village rather than the centre of the Capital City at a time when we have been having massive power cuts this past year - and they continue spasmodically (as I write the power has just gone off again for a few hours so posting it to the blog will have to wait a while - maybe till tomorrow), as well as now water issues.

The southern part of Botswana where we live is in a very serious water crisis.  The main dam (Gaborone Dam) is only 11% full - apparently one of the lowest levels it has been since the dam was built in the 1960s.  That figure is even more of a problem since we only have around 2 months of the rainy season left and those dam levels will only supply enough water for about another 2 months without further inflow.  All the water for the south-east corner doesn't come only from that dam BUT... the dam across in South Africa where some water is bought is also very low so Botswana's small quota has been halved AND the other little dam nearby was totally dry a few months back and now only has about 4% of its capacity.  

There is usually also water piped down from a dam further north that is mostly at reasonable capacity but it seems that pipeline seems to leak a lot and sometimes actually bursts as it did last month again, and so while it is repaired the pipe-line has to be shut down completely.  Another dam that was recently finished being built that will connect to that pipeline from the north has just been finished and is filing up nicely, but the pipe connecting that dam to the north-south carrier pipe is still under construction and is behind schedule!

 - all this in addition to other various burst pipe lines and pipe-line failures has meant massive water shortages.

Consequently we are on severe water rations.  Most of the city has no water coming out the taps for 8-12 hours of the day, for three days of every week.  And in between times the pressure has been much reduced.  In our village the water pressure has become so low that there isn't enough pressure to get the water to the elevation we are, since our house is ever so slightly a little up the hill.  

So for a while we had no water at all coming out our taps!!  That means no water for the washing machine to run, the dishwasher to run or the hot water tank to fill up.  So we have been doing everything 'village' style. Bathing is using a bucket, and water used for handwashing and bathing gets saved to be used to flush toilets. (since we don't have an outdoor 'pit latrine' type toilet).  Plants essentially don't get watered except for the herbs we eat.  And we try to capture some of the water that falls when it does manage to rain (which is the one negative about having a thatch roof - you can't attach gutters....although we are working on trying to invent some kind of system to at least catch some of it).

We now have 5 jerry cans that we can fill by either going into town and filling them up at friends' places when we visit or at the one tap on the property that has a little bit of water coming out of it at the bottom of the hill by the gate...or even just to keep them full in case of a sudden water pressure drop or other problem resulting in no water.

Thankfully we have a great landlord, who also lives on site and further up the hill than we do!   He has been working hard putting in a special pump that can function on the low water pressure and he fills a tank that then gets pumped into a larger tank higher up the hill that then feeds by gravity into our water supply.  It doesn't mean we have continuous water supply, as the pump sometimes fails and the pressure is still quite variable, but it is good to sometimes now have a little bit of water coming out of the taps again.

These experience have reminded me though of how time consuming it is to have to function without the luxuries of power and running water in your house. - how much longer washing clothes, dishes, and washing one's self takes.  It has also definitely reminded me of why we don't see any type of ornamental 'flower' gardens in village settings - 

when you have to carry all the water you use - the priority is 

drinking and cooking, 

followed by bathing, 

and then washing clothes 

and house cleaning.  

The only water that goes on plants, goes on plants that are necessary for food.  And if water is really low, it is only going to be used for drinking and cooking.  I have a better 'appreciation' and understanding for those who don't bathe for weeks - those folks who you can smell coming, from a long way off!!! Sitting next to a such a person in a vehicle or in church is nauseating!   Now, Ok for some of those it might be laziness, but maybe for some it is simply lack of water.  Villages here, even if they have a 'stand-pipe', can have it fail and they go for weeks without easy access to water.

The physical desert lacking in physical water, begets a desert in life lacking beauty and colour, and even cleanliness.  

What a picture that is of our spiritual situation as well - in a spiritual desert there is a lack of living water, and without the regular living water, not only do we wilt and die but we also lose an ability to see joy in our circumstances and hope in our hurts, and we get accustomed to dirt and the putrid stench of our sin as though it is normal.

As we continue to pray for the physical rain to fall on this desert land, penetrate the earth and fill the dams, we also pray that living water may fill the hearts and minds of people here so that lives may be transformed, cleansed of the stench of sin that permeates so much, so they will begin to become vessels and pipes through which that water may flow out to the lives of others also.