Can you bring me a glass of WATER please?

Imagine you are at a high end restaurant, your favorite restaurant, your sitting at the table with your friends having a great time talking about your life, romance and gossiping about the people who didn't show up to dinner (just kidding I know we don't ever do that), you ask the waiter for a cup of water, the waiter nods his head and walks towards the bar. You continue talking with your friends, when all of the sudden the waiter bring your water and it looks like this...

[Google images]

What in the world would you do? In America, we would have a fit! We would call the manager, tell the manager and waiter some "choice" words and call the health inspector, take a picture and post it on Facebook and do the whole "nine" yards. After you would have complained, most likely this picture would be "BREAKING NEWS" and on the first page of the newspaper and the restaurant would be shut down.

Well what if I told you that there are parts of the world where this glass is "normal". I'll let that sink in. What if told you that children have access to this water, and drink this water regularly.

This glass tells a story, and this is why I chose the public health topic of access to healthy water.

America has spoiled me. I am so picky about the water I drink, I don't drink tap water, only bottled or purified water. Water is a choice for me, coffee is more my thing, but I know that if my throat is dry, all I have to do is go to my refrigerator and grab me a bottle of water that is clean and purified.  How ridiculous am I? ( You don't have to answer that lol).

Once in undergrad, I was so poor that my water got "cut-off".  It only lasted for one day and a half, and I will tell you that I had no idea how important water was to me, until I didn't have it. We use water for nearly everything, washing our hands, dishes, bodies, hair, toothbrush, before we put toothpaste on it, coffee pot, food and etc. For one day I had to experience what many people experience daily. Talk about a humbling experience, a day without water, will definitely make you appreciate it a little more.

In rural Kosovo, clean water is not really an option. This village in rural Europe literally has to ration water, especially in the summer months and often the water they have is not disinfected, leaving adults and children sick.

[Google images]

The water is so dangerous here that the CDC has a list of what not to do when consuming the water here,

Don’t Drink

• Tap or well water
• Ice made with tap or well water
• Drinks made with tap or well water (such as reconstituted juice)
• Unpasteurized milk

You can't even drink tap water, which is something that I hate, but at least can drink from my kitchen sink. Please watch the 3:43 minutes video that talks about the water of Kosovo:

This topic is meaningful to me, because NO ONE should have to drink water that is unsafe. This information has provided insight to a World-Wide concern, and I want to be a change agent for this dilemma that is literally happening around the World. UNICEF has a project that works to provide clean water for children around the world, as do The Water Project and Clean Water U, and I hope that someday down my career path, I'll be able to start a similar project or assist in one of the three listed above.

[Google images]

References:

http://wwwnc.cdc.gov/travel/destinations/traveler/none/kosovo

http://water.org/water-crisis/water-facts/water/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vsTAmFAXgtg