Water, water everywhere

I’m in my twenty-second year, and I don’t know how to boil water.

I’m sitting on the plastic chair in my room. I am sweating profusely as I have just biked home from class. I am ridiculously thirsty - tongue turning green from dehydration thirsty – and I can’t do anything about it.

The white plastic water filter that stands about 2 ½ feet off my table is empty. I finished the last of the water in the reservoir this morning by filling my Nalgene water bottle.

To get more water is easy; there’s a spigot about 20 feet from where I am currently sitting. To get water that is potable involves heating the water to a rolling boil, sustaining the boil for 3 minutes, letting the water cool, dumping the water in my filter and then letting the water filter through for the next hour or so.

The real problem, though, is not dehydration. I don’t know how to light the charcoal needed to start the fire to boil the water.

I pride myself on being an independent person. I rarely ask people to do me favors, and I gain a certain sense of satisfaction from being able to do things by myself. But now that I’ve moved to a foreign country where I had to relearn how to brush my teeth to avoid getting sick, rarely do I get to do things without asking for help.

I am older than my siblings here, but Loic, who is 11, knows far more about this world than I do. For now, my siblings are my teachers – in French, in how to wash your clothes, in how to reset the electric circuit in your room, in where to throw your trash, in how to sweep, in who has the best avocado sandwiches, in where to buy flipflops and how much you should bargain down the price, in where to get clothes sewn, in how to respond appropriately to greetings, in how to boil water.