Who doesn’t love finding money? I found a ten pence piece the other day and felt over the moon! But at the same time, if I were to lose ten pence I don’t think I’d notice; the person whose ten pence I found obviously didn’t. So when I opened a paper today and was asked to donate £2 a month to “Give water. Give life” I was pretty shocked. Water is something we take for granted. We complain because too much of it falls and makes our rivers overflow, and we make tea without even thinking. We can have a shower – a hot one at that – whenever we want, and don’t think twice about flushing the toilet. But what if we didn’t have the water to make the tea? Or if the water we did have to make tea was taken from a muddy puddle, miles from home. What if we could never have a shower? And what would happen if we didn’t have a toilet to flush?
£2 a month works out at less than 7p a day! Yet it is enough to supply the most poverty-stricken communities with tools and pipe-work that would prevent diarrhoea and dysentery, and save millions of people (WaterAid claims that every 20 seconds, a child dies of water-related diseases). Most of us don’t bat an eyelid at spending £2 on a sandwich, or a pint, or a glossy magazine. So I have to wonder why more of us don’t donate to charities like WaterAid; it doesn’t take much, but regular donations allow them to plan and use their funds more effectively. Of course, as students we have to be careful with our finances. But I don’t think spending 7p a day would break the bank; in fact, it could save someone’s life.
(more more info on WaterAid, visit www.wateraid.org)

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