H2O – this is one chemistry formula most of us
will always remember as it was the easiest one! As you know, it represents
water. As you are also well aware of, whether in the form of a molecule or ice,
in liquid or gaseous form, water is an essential element of our very existence.
Residents beneath the sea, denizens within forests, creatures within the
ground, avian in the sky & humans everywhere – all need water for survival.
It is us humans, though, who are responsible for depleting this precious
resource of life because we soak it up too much. It is about time we saved
water and followed a basic principle: Soak it no more!
Let me explain how we are soaking up far too much of
earth’s precious water & what concrete steps we can take to soak it up no
more...
Using the wash basin
What you do: Open the tap to its maximum limit. Take a
toothbrush, apply toothpaste, brush teeth. Peer at your face in the mirror. All
this time water is flowing, flowing...down the basin’s drain.
What you should do: Keep that tap closed till you
complete the entire applying paste-brushing-peering-in-mirror process. Open it
only when you are actually going to wash your mouth & face. Also, do not
open it fully – just enough to fill up the cup of your palm. When a male member
of your family is shaving, do tell him not to keep that tap open throughout the
shaving process & waste water. Open the tap only when required. In fact, it
is a good idea to install taps which do not release excess water at all &
to have an extra valve at the side to control the flow of the water.
In the loo
What you do: Each time you use the loo, even for a
minimal time, you flush an entire tank of water. Gone literally down the
toilet.
What you should do: In the first place, always install a
flush tank which has the option of using only a few litres of water at a time
[half-flush button]. Try to install the flush tank at waist level instead of
high up on the wall, so that it can be filled by hand too. Keep a bucket of
water inside the loo at one side or just outside the door. If, after flushing
once, the job is not done, don’t again flush another tank-full of water.
Instead, use that bucket of water. Pour it in the flush tank or directly, using
just the required amount of water.
Hand washing clothes
What you do: One bedsheet. One bucket full of water. Put
bedsheet in bucket, letting it soak up the water. Keep lifting it up, dropping
it back into the bucket...water thereby splashes out constantly. Finally, you
wring out the bedsheet & put it up to dry, throwing away the water left in
the bucket. Similarly, you wash other clothes, using an entire bucket of water
for one garment at a time.
What you should do: Do you need an entire bucket of water
for one bedsheet? Surely you can use only the required amount needed. What’s
more, instead of throwing away that remaining water, you can use it to water
plants or for the loo’s flush tank.
Note: A new product called Surf Excel Matic aims to
eliminate the soaking process altogether. Water saved!
Washing clothes in a washing machine
What you do: Fill up the machine with gallons of water
even when the clothes to be washed are just a few. Drain it. Fill again a
second time to do additional rinsing and remove any traces of detergent. Drain
it. Put clothes in dryer. More water drained out.
What you should do: Put in only as much water as
is needed, as per amount of clothes. Put the other end of the machine’s drain
pipe into a bucket. Now, when you drain the water, it does not literally go
down the drain. Instead, it is saved.
That water, being soapy, is not at all bad for washing floors! Moreover, it is
not at all necessary to use the washing machine every single day. You can
easily schedule 2 or 3 days of the week to wash outdoor clothes & simply
hand wash daily wear.
In the kitchen
What you do: Wash rice. Wash dal. Wash veggies. Throw
away the water. Cook rice. Drain out water if any remaining. Boil potatoes,
carrots, etc. Throw away the water.
What you should do: Do not throw away any of the water.
Water used to boil vegetables can be used to make soups. Water used to wash
veggies, rice, dal, etc can be used to water plants.
Water bottles
What you do: Your kids return from school with some water
still left in their water bottles. You throw it away. You have taken a bottle
of water to the office but not finished it. At the end of the day you throw it
away.
What you should do: You can drink up that water at dinner
time. If not needed, then water the plants or keep aside for washing rice &
veggies.
Festivals
One of the many ways in which we are depleting water
resources is by immersing idols after a puja or major festival into natural
water bodies – ponds, lakes, rivers, seas. Over time, the constant clogging of
such water bodies leads to just that – lesser & lesser water and more
things which do not dissolve in water at all but tend to soak it up. This is
also leading to pollution of water bodies.
What we can do: Use eco-friendly idols during festivals
like Ganesh Chaturthi and Dassehra. Provide man-made water bodies such as
temporary tanks for immersion of these idols.
Water is precious. Save every drop. Soak it up no more!
This is an entry for the Soak No More contest at IndiBlogger.i. Liked it? Say so here.
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