Bucket Showers

Water is delivered to our house once a week.  When it comes, we fill up 2 barrels and a couple of trash cans with a hose and the let the rest fill up a tank that sits above the house.  This water has to last between 4 and 7 of us a whole week of washing clothes, flushing toliets, showering, washing dishes and drinking water.  The hose however does not reach the the barrel in my bathroom, so i have to take my little pail and carry water through the house to fill up another barrel.  It is a very slow process.  about 100 buckets full will get the barrel close to full.

So, to shower.  I drag the blue plastic barrel full of water across the floor so that is is somewhat close to the shower.  Then i take that same little bucket, dip it into the barrel and proceed to pour ice cold water on my head to get my hair wet.  Talk about take your breath away cold!  my roommate dumps the whole bucket really quick on her head but im still not brave enough to do that, so i let it slowly trickle on my hair.  then i put shampoo in like normal, and rinse with more ice cold water.  It is really hard to fell 100% clean when the water is so cold and you cant wash you whole body... but its what i have.  I have gotten my showers down to only using 2 buckets worth of water which i find very impressive.  less then 2 gallons to take a shower!  Once i am done, the floor is pretty wet and i have to push the full barrel back across the floor to its spot behind the door.  It definatley wakes you up in the morning but i perfer to go home at lunch time when its not 50 degrees out, and the sun is up so it can warm me up when im done.

Overall life is really good down here. i leave tomorrow morning to pick up a group in Managua so i wont have internet for over a week while i work with them.  I miss everyone back home but i definatley feel at home here too.