Matanzas/Sweat runs on his forehead when he discovers, as a revelation, that the wide window of the Episcopal Church is open on San Juan de Dios Street. The young man does not reach spiritual help, but of the indispensable liquid for life. The crisis of the supply in Matanzas, aggravated in the last month, has made the temple an unexpected shelter for hundreds of neighbors.
“This has been the salvation of my children during the three years that we have been living in Pueblo Nuev 14ymediowhile taking several empty blockers out of the backpack. “I thought they would not be serving today, but faith is the last thing that is lost.”
Every Monday, Wednesday and Friday, if there is electricity, the Church offers purified water to anyone who needs it, regardless of creed or neighborhood. “Everyone can carry water here, even if it is not a Christian. The problem is that without current they cannot give it the necessary purification and we have seen ourselves very harmed with this situation,” explains the young man, resigned to sometimes spend the whole morning waiting in vain.
/ 14ymedio
“The most complicated thing is not to be able to fill the blockers on Friday, because then we spend the whole weekend drinking water without any quality. Even for this the electric company makes it difficult,” he acknowledges.
Purification teams came as a donation of Living Waters for the World, a non -profit American organization that has already installed systems in more than 70 points of Cuba, including the Evangelical Seminar of Theology and the Presbyterian Church of Versailles, in Matanzas.
“They have a hose from the same team to the window. From the outside you just have to open the feather“, describes the neighbor, grateful.” On the street a small five -liter tank with water costs 1,000 pesos. Here one gives what you can as an offering, and that is optional. Too bad that in recent times the lack of current is taking tense even to drink clean water, quality. ”
Since two months ago this newspaper Visit the peculiar water dispenserthe situation has only worsened with the blackouts and the patients have triggered a rare condition that extends through the province of Matanzas. With high feversarticular pains and much decay, the sick especially suffer the lack of drinking water to maintain personal and domestic hygiene.
The need to have a quality water supply has multiplied demand but the effort that has to carry to houses is something that many families, composed only of elders and convalescent people of some virus, cannot afford. The youngest are, most of the time, those in charge of loading the cubes and containers with which homes are supplied.
Not only the residents of the nearby area come to the temple. Pedro, who lives in Peñas Altas, challenges precarious transport every week to fill his bottles. “In my area the situation with the water supply is critical. When they put it two or three times a week, what comes out through the pipe is mud,” he says. “I had a purified water for ten days ten days ago because of the current problem and ended up sick of the stomach. It is better to load pomos with water than to die of some virus, a bacterium or a parasite in the water.”
Not only the residents of the nearby area come to the temple. Pedro, who lives in Peñas Altas, challenges precarious transport to fill his bottles every week
Luck, he acknowledges, does not always accompany him. “Before I called on the phone and I came to the insurance, but I think that now in the Pastoral House there is no one to answer. Other times I had to leave with nothing. Today I was lucky.” At 58, and despite declaring an atheist, Pedro appreciates the church’s work: “They give a great help to the people. They are holding with their means what the government is not able to do, and without asking for anything in return. The water I carry does not solve the whole situation, but it relieves a lot.”
The paradox is bitter: the province sits on the most important urban water table in Cuba, an underground corridor of more than 70 kilometers that goes from the Canasí arches to the springs of Bello. That water course, described by the historian Ercilio Vento Canosa as the “Ghost River” in his book Matanzas and their secretscrosses the city and flows into the pompon, where he joins the Yumurí. However, for many families, that invisible flow is just a mythical resource against the daily thirst.
The scene in front of the Church takes place without a fuss or queues, rare exceptions in the city. “It seems right to me that the limit are five blinks. There are very abuser people who take advantage and then reveal the water. I try to save as far as the thirst allows me,” says another user, while filling their containers. No one controls the amount of liters extracted or the money deposited in the piggy bank. The flow is silent, discreet, until suddenly a buzz announces the end of the day: the current was left.
The purification system goes out and Pedro, with the jaba on his shoulder, breathes deep. He has achieved enough for four or five days. “I saved on Tabitas,” he murmured, before getting down downhill.
