Precious water

"They were planting grass on the main road, outside the new school today," I told my husband recently.
"No, it's that artificial stuff they're putting down," he confidently replied.
OK, he must be right, I thought!!! Surely grass, that most thirsty of ground coverings, is not being planted on the open roadside.
However, when I drove past the following morning, the ubiquitous "they", that is, the Greater Amman Municipality, were installing irrigation pipes, obviously not, for synthetic grass.

Ever since I came to Jordan, nearly 30 years ago, I have heard the same dire warnings about water shortages and what this means to the country. I have railed against citizens of Amman who have insisted on their cars being cleaned daily as well as the sidewalks outside their villas, and looked on in shocked horror at the immaculately manicured lawns of western Amman.

For many years the powers that be have discussed the "Disi this" and the "Red/Dead that". There have been government sponsored campaigns urging citizens to adopt water saving strategies. Every year the media reports on the amount of rainfall, centimeter by precious centimeter. We watch with abated breath as the dams fill up steadily and we become more and more frustrated as allocations of water to our homes decrease in the summer from twice a week, to once a week and sometimes even nothing.

So how come, the very organization that should be setting an example, showing the rest of us how to economize on our precious water, should be wasting it so wantonly? M