The Water Supply in Guate

In our first home in Guate, we were the beneficiaries of a cistern managed by the neighborhood management.  That meant that with one exception, we never had any water service interruptions.

If you live in real Guate, you can experience frequent outages.  Expat Mom detailed some experiences in an old post here.

Genesis has adapted well, and now has her own rooftop cistern.  You really have to have this stuff because people here just don’t think anything about cutting your access to water.  Of course, like with everything else in Guate it’s not as simple as you might think:

That, my dear readers, is a water tank, sitting on top of the bathroom, which automatically kicks in when the town water goes out. Since that has been happening on a daily basis for about a month thanks to all the roadwork being done in town (they smash pipes on an hourly basis, it seems), a tank was a good investment.

Now we have running water when no one else does and though it’s gravity fed, there’s enough pressure to shower, wash dishes and clothes, as well as flush the toilet (woohoo!). We no longer have to send our maid home early on a daily basis because she can’t wash anything.

Unfortunately, since the tank is on the roof, it’s visible to everyone, including my mother-in-law who is so jealous that she has been turning our water off on purpose. I’m really not sure what that’s supposed to accomplish, apart from us getting our own water lines put in, considering that we currently pay the water for both houses . . . . I wouldn’t be pissing off the people who pay my utility, but I guess she isn’t thinking about that.