Empathetic Experience

How many miles can you walk in a day? What about carrying 50 pounds of water? Our empathetic experience explores having to walk long distances with heavy loads for the basic human necessity of drinking water, and life in areas without access to clean drinking water.

The Photo Tunnel

The photo tunnel is made out of PVC pipe, which is usually used for plumbing, and fabric from Rwanda, a small country in Eastern Africa bordering Tanzania and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

The tunnel is filled with photos and statistics mostly from Ethiopia and India and some from around the world. On average women and children have to walk 3.7 miles to find water to drink, and many times this water is unsanitary [5]. The tunnel is 8 feet long, making each step in the tunnel approximately equal to 1,480 steps that water collectors must walk daily.

As you walk through the tunnel remember these things: many homes in the world do not have plumbing or water, the fabric has been handled and made by people that struggle with having access to water, each step you take is fifteen hundred steps of a water collector, and most importantly, the photos are of real people living with the reality of not knowing if they can find water.

Buckets

The second part of the Empathetic Experience is the ’water‘ buckets. Because water can be unwieldy and is prone to spilling, we have substituted rocks of a comparable weight. Water collectors must carry anywhere up to 110 pounds, 3.7 miles every day [5]. The average weight of water that is carried is 44 pounds [1]. Pick up a bucket to feel how heavy 44 pounds is. Now, imagine carrying it for three or more hours while walking in the scorching sun.

H2 Uh Oh!

The third part of the Empathetic Experience is the H2 Uh Oh!* game. This game represents the difficulty of finding water in many areas of the world. Playing as a water collector, you move around the screen to retrieve the water buckets before your health runs out. Walking off the page is traveling too far and not finding water. Not retrieving the water fast enough is not finding enough water or water that is unclean.

*Credits to Nature In Focus for the title of the game.

Links to Donate

The final thing you will see in the exhibit is our posters showing some of the top charities and nonprofits working to alleviate the water crisis across the world. Consider donating to these organizations to send a little of your water to someone who doesn’t have access to clean, sanitized, indoor water. You can find a list of these organizations plus links on the main page.