Blog Action Day takes place every year on October 15. Bloggers from around the world post about the same issue with the aim of sparking a global discussion and driving collective action. This year’s topic is water.
I’ll never forget my first big trip away from home. It was 2004 and I was in New York City, ready to live and work for six months. Incidentally, home at the time, was Delta, British Columbia, Canada.
The morning after I arrived in New York, having already seen the bright lights of Time Square under a barely visible midnight moon, I sat down to breakfast and ordered a glass of water. Instead of the glass, the server brought me a bottle. (Is this a New York, thing? Or is it not a good idea to drink from the tap?)
I twisted off the cap and was ready to take my first swig when I recognized the tiny emblem in the bottom corner of the bottle’s label. It was a Canadian Flag. After reading the fine print, I realized that I was drinking water all the way from my hometown of Delta, BC. I didn’t even realize the suburban town where I grew up had a water bottling plant.
Today, on Blog Action Day, I can’t help but think about the idea of “home” and the water that flows toward it for all of us to drink. How does it get there? Does it come in bottles or do we drink it treated or fresh from a well? Do we run it through a Brita filter? Do we even think about it for more than a moment on any given day?
British Columbia is covered in Pacific rain forest. We have a lot of fresh water because of our beautiful mountains and valleys. Water accounts for most of our energy in BC. We have so much of it, we can sell it to the United States. The province flips a switch and the power that we thought was produced by water is now coming from Alberta and is produced by coal.
The next time you think about where you live and the place you call home, consider how the water you drink and use to cook and wash yourself travels from it’s own home to you. Consider the cost it takes to get to you, both economical and ecologically speaking. Consider the 1.1 billion people in developing countries who have inadequate access to water. And, yes. Consider signing this petition that supports efforts by the UN to bring clean drinking water to those who do not currently have access to it.