Drawing Water

The Value of Each Drop

It was in the midst of the dry season when we arrived in Sirasso, February 1969. Crammed in the front seat of a Peugeot 404 pick-up truck with Monsieur Despond at the wheel, corpulent and sweating profusely, for a whole parched day of swirling red dust on washboard road, we finally made it to our site. Despond was a French civil servant with the Ministry of Construction and Urbanism. He was a remnant of colonial rule, about to finally leave the Côte d’Ivoire in the hands of Ivorians. He duly delivered us to our new home.

If we were hoping to make a good first impression, this was not about to happen. The first thing Despond wanted to do was find a beer (don’t drink the water!). He lit up yet another pungent Gauloises cigarette (thankfully we were no longer in the confines of the pick-up cab), and cutting a fine figure in his dusty, sweat stained tank top and short khaki shorts he waddled with us down a village path until we came to a round adobe hut, that he must have known about from one of his previous visits.

“Trois BRACODI’s” he ordered in greeting. The shopkeeper rummaged around amongst the cans of tomato paste, boxes of matches, tins of instant Nescafé, and cans of condensed milk until he brought out three warm bottles of Bracodi beer – beer of the Côte d’Ivoire. This was not a refreshing way to quench a dusty thirst, nor a proper introduction to a person living in Sirasso.

Despond had us unload our few belongings at a small house where we were to live, and then delivered us to the Sous-préfet, the Ivoirian administrator of the district. The Sous-préfet was surprised that two “blancs” (white men), from America no less, would consent to live in this isolated, primitive, and forgotten outpost of his country.

We discovered our house was part of a compound abandoned by the French. It consisted of our house, a house now used by the Sous-préfet’s cook, and another building with a series of rooms that would eventually be used by our mason, his wives and three children. Cooking was done over a fire in the outdoor space in front of their quarters. This was also their place for sitting and for the children to play, typical of village compounds, where most of the living was outdoors.

Our house had two bedrooms, a sitting room, a small kitchen open to the outdoors with a counter, sink, and propane stove; a pit toilet and a closet-sized enclosure for washing. It was actually the perfect size for the two of us, and had two beds; some chairs, some cabinets, and a couple of tables. The floor was tiled; the walls stucco over adobe blocks, and the windows wide with wooden louvered shutters to let light and air in. We had a shady covered porch, and a flame acacia tree in front. We would use kerosene lamps for lighting, and later when Peace Corps delivered the rest of our supplies we would have a kerosene refrigerator.

Completing the colonial compound were a warehouse where building materials and other supplies for the sous-préfecture were stored, and a well, located right in the center. It was concrete-lined, and finished above ground with a low circular wall and a concrete apron.

Before we hung our mosquito netting over the beds and unpacked our water filter, pots and pans and other necessities, I grabbed a bucket and went out to the well to get some water. We would boil it and then put it in our filter to provide us with a supply of drinking water.

This was going to be my first time ever to draw water from a well. It was not only my introduction to the experience, but also my introduction to a handful of neighbor children who were at the well. Their surprise at seeing a strange white man coming to the well was a source of some wary giggles and cautious uncertainty. I greeted them in Dyula, a local lingua franca, and watched them get some water. The bucket for the well was a length of automobile inner tube with a strong heavy gage wire hoop sewed to one end to hold it open, and the other end was stitched to close the bottom. The wire handle was attached to a rope some 75 feet long.

The process to get water was to lower the bucket and when it rested on the water, give it some jerks so that water would go in and it would sink. Then it was hauled up and emptied into containers. After watching for a while they gestured for me to try. I got lots of laughs as I awkwardly lowered and jerked the bobbing bucket to get it to sink, and then pulled it up.

Needless to say, I eventually got good at it and got to know some of the boys and girls who were frequently there. Occasionally some women came to get water also, for cooking, drinking and washing, so the well became a sort of initial meeting place. Introducing me to some of the people who were living in our section of town.

Eventually our supplies arrived and they included a thirty-gallon container (a large plastic trash can with a lid) in which we would store water for our daily needs. Also, our mason and his family moved into the compound as our work was soon going to start. One afternoon I heard water being poured into our container and I saw our mason’s second wife making trips to the well and filling it up. Shortly, our mason, Adama, came into our house and sat down. After exchanging greetings and some small talk he said, “Patron, it is not good for you to get water from the well. It is the work of women and children.” I reflected that I had never seen another man drawing water from the well. Had I unwittingly violated a cultural taboo? Adama continued, “I have assigned my wife, Djenebou, to bring you water every day and fill up your container.”

Water was not scarce in our village, but the very act of getting water bucket by bucket, raising it from a well, and then carrying it to our house made every drop precious. Even though Djenebou kept our water supplied, there were occasions when I would go to the well to draw water. I noticed that during the monsoon season I needed less rope to reach the water. I saw a measurable difference in ground water level from the dry season to the rainy season, and during the dry season the water was not as clear. Taking bucket baths also showed me how to use water economically. I eventually rigged up a shower in our washing room made of a gallon bucket from which I could pour water into a perforated tin can “shower head” and take a shower. Not having running water taught me basic conservation, and the value of each drop.

Becoming a Doctor

The morning sounds of the village awakened me as usual. The staccato high-pitched chorus of guinea hens outside our front door, the bleating of sheep as they passed by on their morning rounds, the sputtering of the old Billy goat chasing a doe running and crying in protest, the sweep, sweep of Adama’s wives cleaning the courtyard, all punctuated by the distant village heartbeat of grain being pounded in wooden mortars. (Read more >>)