A lesson on water conservation from China

Sometimes it takes a simple event to make us realise there are always other ways to do things. For example, is there a "better" way to shower? It wasn't something I'd thought about since our family already tried to save water by taking shorter showers.

But our exchange student from China taught us there is more than one way to wash.

We could hear the taps constantly being turned on and off every time she had a shower. Intrigued, I politely tried to raise the subject of how she washed. She explained that she turned the water on to wet herself, then turned it off to wash her body, on again to rinse off, off while she washed her hair and on again to rinse etc.

"How do you have a shower", she asked?

"Well, we leave the water on the entire time", I replied.

She was amazed, and in retrospect so was I, at our behaviour. How bizarre that we have this system of washing which uses so much precious water unnecessarily. She explained that in China water is expensive and everyone is taught to conserve it. She would never dream of leaving the shower on continuously.

So now I have been researching whether other types of taps in our showers would allow them to be turned on and off, maintaining the right temperature. Plus I wonder if other cultures can open our eyes to more ways to save the earth's resources? I'm sure they can!

If you have exampes of how other cultures conserve resources, please pass on the details to us.

Scott Elsom