Shaping the future
20-year-old Elin from Berkshire recently completed a work placement with World Vision UK. While she was discovering the impact for vulnerable children, those children had an impact on Elin herself.
As an undergraduate Psychology student at the University of Warwick, I was delighted to undertake a placement at World Vision UK, helping to report the impact of their work around the world.
My whole life I have grown up in a privileged environment, where water has never been a source of worry. Growing up, I was aware of water struggles around the world (it would be on the news etc.), but I was naïve as to how broad and widespread the impact was, because that was never my reality, and it was hard to comprehend. I took water for granted.
As I matured, I became increasingly aware of the issue of water famine, mainly because I began to take an interest in my South African heritage. South Africa is very susceptible to the effects of El Niño, resulting in devastating changes to the environment: droughts and water shortages leading to planned water supply cut-off. At the same time seasonal flooding effecting the townships. Speaking to a family member in Capetown, she described her stepson as ‘A child of drought’, who has had to grow up consciously aware and respectful of water usage, each night asking whether he should keep the water he has just washed with to use for the toilet flush. This is something that I have grown to understand, rather than directly experiencing it myself.