Water. Earth’s most precious resource. With only six countries holding nearly half of the world’s fresh water supply, you can imagine the importance of our educating our children and neighbors on why we should be conserving water.
The Field Museum of Chicago does a fabulous job educating community about water in their special exhibition titled, Water. My 8 year old daughter and I went to the exhibit this week to learn more about how water really functions in the world. Above you see her studying a very cool reservoir simulating machine.
First, the exhibit addressed the basic properties of water. One of my favorite parts of this section was the amazing water sculpture (see below) that showed water in it’s three physical states – liquid, solid, and gas. Visitors can touch and feel all three states with a hands-on, water-cycle sculpture.
John Drengenberg, corporate spokesperson from Underwriters Laboratories (UL) (one of the sponsors of the incredible Water exhibit in Chicago) walked with us through the tour. While we talked about the importance of water, John explained UL’s involvement in testing water in over 7000 community’s nationwide.
John emphasized that having access to and keeping water clean and safe is important for the survival of our world. UL feels it is one of the most important roles they have in helping our communities live cleaner. Shockingly, more than a billion humans live without dependable access to safe drinking water. Imagine that GIANT number – one billion people - who suffer daily simply because they do not have clean drinking water.
My daughter experienced the difficulty of trying to lift a typical jug of water that millions of women and girls have to carry every day in developing countries. As you see in the photo to the left, she could not lift it easily, in fact neither could I - it was quite a humbling experience. These women and girls must forego school or jobs simply so they can spend all their time dedicated to the simple and basic task of carrying water for the family. This means their family must live in poverty.
Perhaps one of these women could have been the next Marie Curie or Amelia Earhart or Georgia O’Keefe; important women in our world’s history. We shall never know because they must spend all their time dedicated to a type of slavery – water slavery – born out of necessity.
Water is organized by the many museums in a grand partnership with will have the exhibit touring around the nation and world. Please go see the exhibit if you can – it will show you a whole new perspective on a resource we simply take for granted. The link to more information detailing the water exhibit is here - www.fieldmuseum.org/water.
Make a difference in your community by not wasting water. Use less chemicals such as fertilizers and insecticides on your property as well. Do your part to keep the clean water we have. To learn more about your home water usage, please go to the online Water Calculator provided by the Field Museum - watercalculator.fieldmuseum.org.
This exhibit will be open through September 20, 2009 in Chicago – do not miss it!
Shawna Coronado says Get Healthy! Get Green! Get Community! www.thecasualgardener.com, The Green Blog - www.gardeningnude.com, or The Garden Blog - http://thecasualgardener.blogspot.com
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