Californians struggle to find 'normal life' without water

Four years of drought continuously affects residents in California

A normal life remains to be far-fetched for residents in the town of Monson, CA, located 200 miles from the northern part of Los Angeles. Residents in the area have already spent four gruesome months without running water in their homes. The four years of drought experienced by the area has made living quite difficult for its residents and the neighboring areas.

MUNTINLUPA, PHILIPPINES (Catholic Online) - Maria Jimenez, resident of of Monson, claims trying to live a normal life in their area is really hard. For four months, their household, as well as other residential areas near them, have been living without running water in their homes.

The 52-year-old was born in Mexico and is used to fetching water from a source located 1.6 kilometers from their home. However, now, that village in Guadalajara enjoys running water in every home. As much as she would like to share her current situation with her family back in Mexico, she would not dare. She was after all living in a rich country.

"They would tell me 'Come home! What are you doing there?'" she shares in Spanish.

Jimenez belongs to several of the low-income households in California that lives without direct access to water in central California's Valley, popularly known as America's food source.

Families, like Jimenez's, have devised several different ways to save water while going on with their daily activities. Bottled water is being used for taking showers and they created a system so water can reach the top of their roof and go back down their shower heads. Drinking water from the wells supplied to their homes was impossible. The water present in this now dried up well was polluted by pesticides and not safe for consumption.

Farmers living in the area have suffered from instabilities. They are either left with the option to dig new wells costing $35,000, with the reality that they would become polluted as well. Pumping ground water was the only option available for these farmers with the lack of surface water in the area.

Monson is part of several communities affected by the drought in the Tulare County. Other areas include, Highland Acres, Porterville, Woodville and Terra Bella.

Authorities are still trying to device long-term solutions for the drought in these communities, as well as larger cities. Unfortunately, time and resources plays a major factor in these circumstances.

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