Down the Drain

Since last Friday (7 Aug 09), a broken water main under the street outside my house has been leaking clear, fresh water directly into a street drain. Neighbors phoned and the harriss says that last Saturday someone came by to look at it, promising to "fix it later." Since then, my husband and his office staff have been calling every possible phone number at Maaytuna ("our water" company) trying to find someone to take a report and follow up on it. From the emergency number to another office number to another - for one hour they were bounced from one person to another. Someone gave them the number of the director of the "office of complaints." At 10 am on a weekday, his phone rang and rang; no one answered, no voicemail, nothing.
In the meantime, the water has been bubbling freely for one week, sending many cubic meters of good water down the drain. (I should mention that new water lines were laid under the street within the last year.)

With the millions of donor dollars thrown at water conservation and awareness projects, many of which try to convince rural Jordanian women to use less water than they already do (they get so little to start with), this lack of interest and negligence towards water loss in a well-off Amman neighborhood is infuriating. What needless waste!

I will write to the Jordan Times and ask them to find and post the phone number for reporting water leaks next to their little cartoons that say: "Save Water - Every Drop Counts!" The number listed in their Emergency Numbers table got us nowhere.

In the meantime, if anyone has a suggestion of how to report this to a "live body" and get action, I would be very grateful! Um Dunya