The generator companies and those people selling water make good business on this side of the Atlantic. When I say water, I don’t mean drinking water, I mean gallons of water used for everyday use such as cooking, cleaning etc. I don’t think I ever experienced no water flowing from the pipes when I was back in London. My dad used to go on about when he was a little boy, walking miles just to fetch water and I used to laugh. Now I’m laughing on the other side of my face I can tell you.

Still got this cold I cannot shift, so decided to extend my weekend by another day to rest (I had already booked a days leave so there was no need to call in sick). I had to get my laundry done because I had run out of clothes to wear. Normally I would do this on the weekend but as I was not around I was forced to do it yesterday. I thought by programming the machine to economy I wouldn’t use so much, but as luck would have it, just as the last load ended, so did my water supply.

The water in my estate runs normally from Thursday to Saturday, the rest of the week I have a tank of reserved water which works such that when the pipes are flowing normally, the water would also flow into the tank to cover me for the rest of the week. Normally I don’t have a problem, but because of the washing machine, coupled with the fact that I have an extra person in the house, this week it didn’t last. I think also, the Ghana water board did not bother to switch on the pipe so I have been using the reserved water.

I have a big drum of reserve, reserve water in my back yard, so as at 2pm yesterday, that’s what I have been using to wash. I have also bought two big bag full of sachet water to use for cleaning my teeth and cooking. Four years ago I would say “how primitive” today it is the normal way of life. What gets my goat up is that every month the Ghana Water Board will still send a bill for water usage. Meanwhile I have had to call someone in to fill my reserve tank at almost 100GHS (as I said big business), not that I would be re-imbursed for that but oh well.

And there I was wanting to be a homeowner..haa