Humble Living

Six months in Chimoio has opened my eyes to the fact that, despite always thinking of myself as a person who tries to reuse and recycle, I was very, very wasteful before I moved here. I only realize it now that my habits have changed and I find myself quite naturally using the last drop of ketchup in the bottle instead of opening a new one, or giving nine incarnations to the same manila envelope, taking great care not to crush the edges or spill tea on whatever documents might be inside at a given point.

In the shower I now use even the smallest scraps of soap, smashing them together to make a lump large enough that it won’t slip through my fingers as I scrub. Toilet paper is a sacred commodity and we use every sheet on the roll, even the ones that get sort of torn up because they are glued to the roll. I use lotion and shampoo until the very last bit is gone, adding water and storing the containers upside-down to make them last just that tiny squeeze longer. Back in Austin, I would throw out lotion before the bottle was empty because getting that last dollop out that the pump could no longer reach and easily deposit in my hand was way too much work. Sheer laziness, or simply becoming bored with a particular product, would lead me to junk the whole thing in favour of a new scent or a full container.

Things have changed in the kitchen, too. Before moving to Africa, if I was making a dish and used only ¾ of an onion, I would either throw away the remaining part or store it in a Tupperware only to grab a new onion the next time I cooked because I wanted the freshest ingredients possible. I remember making a meal with my friend Kyle and his girlfriend Juleah after they served with the Peace Corp in Turkmenistan and lived in a dirt-floored home with an outhouse. I remember noticing how careful they were to take advantage of every part of a potato, or save even the smallest bits of lettuce. It was strange to me in the sense that they were much more conscientious about recycling than I was and it stood out. Now I understand. Here, every last ring leftover from using an onion gets stored in the fridge to be incorporated into the next dish requiring onion. Every spoonful of rice or pasta salad gets saved, no matter how small the quantity. If nobody gets around to eating or cooking with the leftovers, they become dinner for our 3 Rhodesian Ridgebacks.

Even our dog food is non-wasteful. We don’t usually buy commercial chow for them because it is expensive and can only be found at Shoprite. Unless someone with access to a car is available to go to the store and actually has money on them, the dogs don’t get Purina. Usually, we make our own dog food from rice, bones, and the lower quality cuts of meat that the butcher doesn’t use. We also throw in whatever vegetables are about to turn, an egg or two that nobody is quite sure how long they’ve been in the fridge, or leftovers from our meals.

The definition of when clothes are really dirty has become much more flexible. Whereas in Austin I used to wash nearly everything after one wear, here I only put clothes in the hamper that smell bad or have large stains on them. Not only does washing clothes here totally tear them up and fade the colors, it requires water. We don’t always have water in our house, so we only wash what is truly necessary.

For example, for two days now we have had no water in the house. We have a 2,000 liter tank in our backyard that is where the water provided by the city system flows in and is stored. Then we have another, smaller tank where water is pumped and actually gets connected to our faucets here in the house. The only problem is that the city water supply is quite irregular. Water usually flows into the tank around 6pm, with an average of 500 liters coming through every day. Sometimes, though, no water comes at all. Or maybe it comes in at 4am with only 100 liters, not much for a house with 6 people living in it. We've learned that there is a conspiracy between the water company and the fire department where the city turns off the water so that everyone has to call the fire truck to come around and fill cisterns and tanks with the fire hose. The fire department charges about $20 for this service - totally inflated - and a cut goes, of course, to the city utility company.

Rationing water has become a way of life. On days like today, we only flush the toilet for number two. Everyone fills a bucket to bathe instead of using the shower, trying to limit 3 bucket-fulls per person. We buy bottled water from the bar down the street instead of filtering the tap water through our new Brita pitchers. The maid doesn’t wash any clothes and leaves the dishes for one big scrub at the end of the day using large basins instead of the kitchen sink.

Having to worry about having enough water is terrible. I can only imagine what it must be like for families that have no running water and depend on rivers and community wells that fluctuate with the seasons for any water at all. We don’t really realize how much of everything we do is dependent on an abundant, easily accessible water supply until the well is dry, so to speak.

It has been unbelievably humbling to realize how much I wasted in my previous life – how much everyone wastes – back in the US or even in Brazil. It is deeply troubling to me to think about this now because I thought I was doing a pretty good job of conserving resources. I had no reason to believe otherwise. So many people around me were much more wasteful that me, the typical members of a society obsessed with consumption and super-sized quantities of everything, that my behaviour seemed excellent in comparison. Also, I had never gone without – without food, without office supplies, without water, without a car, without Kinko’s or Costco or Whole Foods – so how would I know if my efforts to conserve were working or not?

You really have no motive to change your behaviour until its damage becomes apparent…