The girls will weep (cos they won’t understand them….) and Valler will whoop with glee, for here are two graphs I just knocked up. This is a man’s week’s worth of water, expressed with colours and stuff.

It’s offical….the water challenge is bad for your health. No I don’t mean not washing for a week, or the creative loo visit, its all to do with the food I’ve ended up eating rubbish all week, just in an effort to save water.

In an effort to save water, I seem to have only eaten food that has either been fried (bacon and eggs are a particular favourite, and require no water), baked in an oven (pizza – water used = 0) or grilled.  It feels like I’ve been on an advanced Atkins diet for the week! Two challenges for the price of one!

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
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aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
hhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
hhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!

for everyone.  clean water, good sanitation, good hygiene, i’ve had the meerest glimpse of how the poor live and it’s ridiculous, it’s not on, let’s continue to do something about changing it.

So the day has finally come-I can have my shower, use my washing machine, clean my house-and I don’t feel as excited as I thought I would. I feel kinda weird this morning. The full force of what we’ve been doing has hit me. The ease with which life goes back to normal is strange and almost feels wrong. Washing my hands and flushing the loo felt so extravagant this morning. I can honestly say I feel quite overwhelmed by the reminder of how rich I am. Bono said ‘ Where you live shouldn’t determine whether you live or die’ and yet it does. People will die today because they don’t have enough water. And I have it flowing out of my taps. May I never forget how fortunate I am and may I do everything I can make a difference for the millions of people for whom every day is a water challenge.

“There’s a popular bumper sticker that reads “God Bless America,” but hasn’t America already been blessed? it’s easy for us to fall into a mindset of viewing “our” world as “the” world, because it’s all we generally see. we’re constantly bombarded with images of the latest styles and models of everything, and it can easily leave us feeling like what we have isn’t enough because we see people that have even more than us. But how does what we have compare to what most people in the world have? Maybe what we have is enough; maybe it’s more than enough. Maybe God has blessed us with everything we have so we can bless and give to others.”

This is a section from the Rob Bell Nooma entitled ‘Rich.’ I’ve watched it and used it many times and always gone “Hmmm, yes, I agree.” I really do agree and always have but it’s taken something short and stupid like this water challenge for me to really understand. I’ve spent time among the poor and am not naive about how they live. I am not oblivious to the decadence with which we live. I have travelled and studied but the power of the lesson learnt from this week has taken me by surprise.

For the most part this week I have lived the way I always have. I haven’t been cold or hungry. I haven’t been sick or even thirsty. In the morning I will go back to normal. We are pretty careful with water generally so little will change there but what I can say, hand on heart and without even a hint of an exaggeration, is tomorrow when I shower, I will know that I am rich.

Today I’m about to spit the dummy – I’m tired of being a bit dirty and having to watch my water;  my hair is in a Croydon face-lift to conceal the dirty, my washing is tripping me up as I leave my bedroom and I’m not drinking enough because I’m generally just using less water. I think that those millions of people that only use 10 liters per day must generally be wandering around a little irritable and vexed and dizzy because they’re mucky and dehydrated. My house is more messy because I’m more messy which makes me have alllll the more respect for those people I have met in Liberia and Afghanistan and Bangladesh who despite  having no running water in the house, despite defecating in the corner of the compound and shovelling it up and chucking it over the wall, despite all this they still take pride in cleaning the house and compound and having self respect that I am sure I would give up fighting for.

Being aware of my water intake has made me more conscious of trying to save resources in all areas – as I buddy-flush with my team and use the dripping tap water to flush at home, I am also using the hand drier instead of the paper towel, I am switching off lights more than I did (JK will just switch them back on for the sake of it though!), I have a generally more conscious attitude of economising in all things.

I take back all my bravado that as a down and dirty field worker I can do this easily, I can’t, I didn’t like it, it was a hassle and I can’t believe people have to live like this, it sucks.

Having said that part of the struggle is that our facilities in the UK are set up to be profligate with resources; our flushes take far too much water, our shopping purchases use far to much plastic, our houses and offices use far too much electricity – it is really hard to save and reduce intake of these resources with the standard facilities, you have to make distinct changes in order to reduce consumption. Its actually easier in the developing world to use fewer resources, by necessity of course, but also by design.

Kate Bowen over and out.

I’m still here! The final day has arrived. I am longing to clean myself, my clothes and my house properly!
Some people have suggested over the course of this week that using things like antibacterial hand-wash is cheating – because people in the developing world don’t have access to such a luxury. I think that kind of misses the point. Because let’s face it, getting my clean, safe 10 litres of water from a tap several feet away, rather than walking for miles to get dirty, unsafe water, is a luxury that many people in the developing world don’t have either.
So if the point of the exercise wasn’t to exactly replicate the circumstances of water usage in the developing world, then what was it?
I think it was about appreciating the precious treasure that water is. About understanding how vital it is for life, health and well-being. And about how we take it for granted and waste it every day while there are millions around the world who can’t.
This water challenge is honestly one of the best things I have ever done. It has changed my perspective, my priorities and my prayer life. I hope I never forget it.

Day 7 of our Water Challenge and it seems we’re collectively running out of puff. There’s only a few of us in the office (and tomorrow there’ll be no-one!), we’re all knackered and the postings have dried up like a prune. No show and tell videos from Valler, no skin flicks from Jay, not even any rage emanating from Hayes, and whether Lou and Tara are still living and breathing at all, we have no idea….

To conclude, it’s the end of our week and man, you can tell! There’s a kind of a grimy, exhausted malaise hanging over the team. Even I, King of not washing all that much, feel in need of a good soak. It’s remarkable, just the way the challenge has totally sapped it out of us. The efforts of calculating our water, having to think fully about every water decision, budgeting your loo breaks and just not getting to clean ourselves regularly, it has taken its toll.

And don’t get me wrong, this isn’t the pathetic wailing moan of the pampered Westerner, this is the realisation that, regardless of how hard we’ve respectively found the challenge, living in the context of ‘not having’ is incredibly draining! And it just goes to prove how cosseted we are in this country, how much we have and how much we should be grateful. And it makes you admire the people we hear about through our partners even more how they manage what we’ve done for one week every day of their lives and yet are filled with life, light and the love of God. And most of all, it makes you want to make even more of a difference, to our lives and their lives, than ever.

And if for no other reason than this, that makes this challenge worthwhile.

day 6

the start of my downfall, too many non-free flushes, i am well, but my body is very confused!  although i started the day with a 2 1/2 litre credit i’ve blown most of the credit by the end of the day.  and

day 7

has got off to a bad start.  although i claimed the extra water my lodger’s brother put in the kettle when he was making a drink as ‘free’ water i had to flush the toilet at home and i’m going out for lunch, and those compulsory 2 litres are going to take me over my limit, unless i don’t drink today!  1 week and i feel run down, my natural immune system is struggling, i smell, my clothes smell, my skin iches, i have spots, pretty sure athlete’s foot is coming back, my guts are messed up from not knowing when they are going to be allowed to ‘move’.  i’ve failed, 20 litres a day would have been too easy.  10 litres, i couldn’t do it, at least i can have a pint this evening to console myself. 2 litres over or 2 1/2, still couldn’t handle it!