Water and Shopping

Thursday, August 2^nd

Can it be possible the time is going so quickly??  Our first week has gone already. I am getting used to the red dust in everything. I am trying to get used to the hard bore water that we wash in, but don’t drink. We collect all our drinking water from a tank (rain water) and carry it to our houses in big plastic bottles/jerry cans.  However, it is bore water that comes out of the taps, and the calcium in it that causes white streaks on everything. No point in wiping down the sink or the shower as there is always a white residue… but my skin feels dry and my hair!!  My hair has gone straight and very flat… my complaint to the principal didn’t get much sympathy, he suggested I shave it off. 

We are already used to the high prices in the one and only shop. Transporting goods by road or air such great distances doesn’t come cheap and the consumer is the one who pays…. Today we bought a box of matches 25c, a small plastic wash basket $10.90, I didn’t buy the $7 cucumber, a Magnum Ice-cream $5.75 or the broom for $22.00. Meat, fruit and vegies are subsidised and not too bad pricewise. We are pleased that the newly built shop is so well stocked. I can only imagine how much needs to be stored in the huge cool store during the wet season (Jan to May) when Robinson River is inaccessible by road.

I wish the shop sold coat hangers… but I guess we can’t have everything!