The Thirst.

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Trip Start Oct 01, 2006 Trip End Ongoing

  Oure Cassoni, Sudan
Wednesday, October 25, 2006

I've reaclimated to the slight taint that the water purification tablets lend to the taste of my water here. Something in the mix of hot water in hotter plastic, overshadowed with the aftertaste of Halazone, is comforting to me. Familiar. More than anything I've experienced these past few weeks, it is the taste of that water - the liquid that leaves the gritty residue of sand on the flat of my molars when I swallow - that has gotten me back into the mental groove of relief work.

As a medical professional, one would think I would instinctively cringe at the communal plastic jug I shared from, moments ago - a long, thin ten gallon container that looked as if it likely spent its first life as a gas canister for the Camp's six recovery vehicles. In the back of my mind, I acknowledge the potential for bacteria growth, for virus transferal, for carcinogens leaching from the heated mud-stained plastic. I calculated the number of refugees who had put their lips to the container before me. I mentally reviewed their histories of rape, of travel, of hardship.

And then, I drank.

In this sort of environment, your world changes. Your views change. Your mind opens. I know, like everyone here, that not to drink would kill me ten times faster than a potentially diseased future. And so, I forget about disease. I forget about contamination. I forget about everything but that thirst, that desert heat - that powerful urge to stay alive.

In the field, it's what you do. You become one of the many. Unintentionally, one of the desperate. A refugee.

One of the thirsty.

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