Water.

While I showered at 3 a.m., between transcribing an interview and responding to a slew of emails from the states, I couldn’t help but wonder about the severe water crisis in Jordan. I turned the knob, three times all the way around, before any water came out of the showerhead. And when the water finally made its way out, it was a mere dribble. As it splattered onto the shower floor, I stepped under the weak stream of water, and even though the knob I turned was on the right, for hot water, it was ice cold on my skin.

I began to lather up, quickly, as I couldn’t bare the cold for too long. All around me, lining the bathtub, were a variety of buckets, all different sizes. They must be there, strategically placed, to catch the excess water, I thought. Water in this country is a precious resource. Let me try that again: water, on our lovely blue little planet called Earth, is a precious resource. I don’t think some people realize that.

I was in and out, drying off with a towel, within 6 minutes. Many of the buckets around me collected some water, most of it soapy. But I think that’s the point, for my host mother to recycle this water that would otherwise be pouring down the drain. Most nights, there is a towel or tablecloth soaking in the large, round blue bin that can always be found in the bathtub. I feel blessed to live in a place where I don’t worry about running or drinking water on a daily basis, but living in a place where I do has changed that. I will now take shorter showers, and make a conscious effort to reduce the amount of water that I use, and more importantly, that I waste. We do all share this planet, after all.

My (second) first story from Amman is published!

Parched Amman slated to get more water by next Spring

Story and photo by Anthony Savvides

Workers, in trucks and on foot, carry and lay pipes for the Disi Water Conveyance Project along Queen Alia Airport Road, stretching from Amman to Aqaba. Here, trenches running along the highway await the pipes to be laid down, about 20 minutes south of Amman.

AMMAN, Jordan – A 200-mile pipeline designed to bring water to the drought-ridden capital is finally making its way into Amman after almost three years of construction and millions of dollars invested in the project. If everything goes as planned, 2.5 million residents here will have access to continuously flowing water one year from now, in May 2013.

The Disi Water Conveyance Project, funded by the government and a number of outside sources including private investment firms, is 75 percent complete. When it’s done, residents of Amman will finally be able to use water without fear of depleting their weekly ration of 3 cubic meters, or about 750 gallons.

“I hope that the water will be an improved solution and the total capacity of the water will be increased,” said Bassam Saleh, the project’s director and an engineer at the Ministry of Water and Irrigation, which is an official branch of the government. “It will be supplied to the people, and continuously supplied 24/7, not like this current situation of the ration of [water delivery] one day per week.”

Jordan, located in the heart of the Middle East and bordering Israel, Syria, Saudi Arabia and Iraq, is the third-driest nation in the world. Its people have long suffered the realities of their geography. With almost no ground water reserves and more than 90 percent of the nation receiving fewer than 8 inches of annual precipitation, water is desperately scarce. In addition, neighboring Syria and Israel have built dams along the Yarmouk and Jordan rivers, respectively, in their countries, which in effect choke these water sources that once flowed onto this country’s soil.

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