IT’S RAINING!

It took long enough. The rains finally came today. We had a short, light rain around lunchtime. When it stopped, everyone was rather upset. I think all of Cambodia is ready to have unyielding, constant rain. They know it’s going to drive them crazy in a couple months’ time, but this extreme heat is not fun. They’re also concerned about the farmers in the area not getting enough rain for their fields, the lake not rising on time, and wells drying up.

Speaking to Deanna today about the wells project, it sounds like the increase in development has brought a new problem: a lower water table. The big hotels have very deep wells that suck up a lot of water, which is then returned to the sewer. Water treatment is not exactly a refined industry here, so most of the dirty water will get only basic treatment (that means filtering out the big stuff) and then returned to the rivers. It takes a while for that to return to under the ground. As a result, there are more and more wells drying up in the late summer season. Thankfully, the wells that our program digs are deep enough to keep flowing, for now.