Water By the Bag

These water bags remind me of elementary school when
they transitioned to milk in a bag in the cafeteria.  These
don't come with straws though, so you bite off the corner.
We know someone with a "pure water" business, they're
basically just bagging the city water in a convenient carrier.

I was excited to read a recent article about people re-using plastic water bottles in a neighboring country for building purposes. This is something that our family had looked into in the states with glass bottles and other re-usable materials, so to see it used in this context was a breath of fresh air. There is such a need for cheap but durable building materials here. The Bible schools and many of the villages we drive through have the common problem of houses falling in because the mud-brick that was used is weakened by the rains and breaks apart after just a few years. It seems like a great solution to put the mud inside plastic water bottles so that it isn’t washed away or crumbling, and then the cement outer layer will have more stability and less likely to crack as well.

Strangely, this led me to remember that one problem is we don’t actually have many water bottles here. People do drink a fair amount of “purified water,” but it comes in clear plastic bags instead (sold for roughly 5 cents). Apparently this is a cheaper way to store it and lighter way to carry it- and I would have thought it’s better for the environment too because the used bags crumple smaller than a bottle. But I did some reading on this and was surprised to find that some environmentalists are vehemently against the water bags because in urban areas they get in the open drains and clog them up. And they argue bottles are much easier (and more likely) to be re-used. I can see that clearly when it comes to building ideas. But maybe there’s a way to stuff water bags with mud too… At least it’s something interesting to explore.

-- El Padre