World Water Day

by B.J. on 3/21/2008 09:10:00 PM 0 comments Print this post

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Fuck a bank; I need a twenty-year water tank
Cause while these knuckleheads is out here sweatin they goods
The sun is sitting in the treetops burnin the woods
And as the flames from the blaze get higher and higher
They say, "Don't drink the water! We need it for the fire!"
New York is drinkin it (New World Water)
Now all of California is drinkin it (New World Water)
Way up north and down south is drinkin it (New World Water)
Used to have minerals and zinc in it (New World Water)
Now they say it got lead and stink in it (New World Water)
Fluorocarbons and monoxide
Push the water table lopside
Used to be free now it cost you a fee
Cause oil tankers spill they load as they roam cross the sea
Man, you gotta cook with it, bathe and clean with it (That's right)
When it's hot, summertime you fiend for it (Let em know)
You gotta put it in the iron you steamin with (That's right)
It's what they dress wounds and treat diseases with (Shout it out)
The rich and poor, black and white got need for it (That's right)
And everybody in the world can agree with this (Let em know)
Consumption promotes health and easiness (That's right)
Go too long without it on this earth and you leavin it (Shout it out)
Americans wastin it on some leisure shit (Say word?)
And other nations be desperately seekin it (Let em know)
Bacteria washing up on they beaches (Say word?)
Don't drink the water, son they can't wash they feet with it (Let em know)
Young babies in perpetual neediness (Say word?)
Epidemics hopppin up off the petri dish (Let em know)
Control centers try to play it all secretive (Say word?)
To avoid public panic and freakiness (Let em know)
There are places where TB is common as TV
Cause foreign-based companies go and get greedy
The type of cats who pollute the whole shore line
Have it purified, sell it for a dollar twenty-five
Now the world is drinkin it"
- Mos Def, New World Water


Listen to New World Water

This is where I put those lessons of act locally, think globally from my high school freshman classes into action, I guess.

I'm lucky to be in a place where practically stolen resources come together for a very cheap price. It's never been lost on me after every run, every game of b-ball, hoop takraw, how lucky I am to have CLEAN water on the cheap.

Yet, even though we have so much clean water available via tap, I'm still trying to break my and my family's psychological dependence on bottled water.

Our tap water in Los Angeles won top honors in February for "best tasting water." Bottled water costs $1000 more than regular water. Even if the water were not pristine clean, George Carlin also once said something to the effect regarding consuming anything considered dirty in the United States "its the immune system, it needs to do its job!"

I guess...

However, before I complete my utter refusal of bottled water, there's still a few things taking grip of my mindset: 1) a meme passed to me by one of my teachers turned sister's godmother: that the tapwater was colored in a certain way 2) the appearance of brownish water in my bathroom sink --- our own pipes seem really dirty and our apartment is pretty old. Dirty pipes in slums in India are what actually make the water dirty. 3) we, meaning my family, don't have any knowledge of filters 4) the fact that the Silver Lake Reservoir (which we don't get our water from, but the residents of South LA, Compton, do...of course) got emptied out because they found some type of chemical that's bad for you.

The bigger issue behind bottled water however is not bottled water itself, but the privatization of human needs.

They say that water issues will be the oil issues of the 21st century.

There was a great academic video, which is embedded below.

View The Privatization of Water on FORA.tv
View The Privatization of Water on FORA.tv

PBS had a great documentary on these issues back in 2K4 called Thirst. I like that they highlighted how privatized water promised to provide clean water, but just ended up fucking things up even more --- right in Stockton, CA.

It's quite disturbing to see water bottling companies trying to strengthen its grip on folks and build this dependence on them. It's business based on fear and scare tactics, which seems to be getting more desperate nowadays cause cities like Frisco and Seattle are countering their crap with anti-water bottle legislation.

This is why I sort of want to be a water filtration expert, and they wouldn't have shit on me.

Anyhow, it's interesting seeing the mother Archipelago being a place of Water Aid.

"Fifteen percent of the all families in the Philippines do not have access to safe drinking water, and 28 percent do not have sanitary toilets. Waterborne diseases are a major cause of infectious disease in the Philippines, and include bacterial diarrhea, hepatitis A, and typhoid fever. Even in the capital of Manila, clean water is difficult to obtain and some Filipinos must pay five to ten times more than what a New Yorker would pay."

My mom also said that there was a certain time of the day where the water would be shut off...something else that sticks to my rib.

I wonder how the Pasig River is doing nowadays. It was declared biologically "dead" in 1994 despite being a place where my mom swore she saw people swimming there when she was a kid.

I'm hoping it has another life in it. Apparently, they're running marathons in it, they're trying to rehab it, and people can actually stomach the stench to take a boat ride on it. It's interesting that she points out that there are squatter folks who live along the dead river --- it's how I got interested in the river in the first place.

Happy Water Day.

World Water Day and Some Facts

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