Well, I am delighted to say that my team and I are finally done with both the script and the final presentation. I admit, we met quite a lot of difficulties, and just after a week I started to feel unconfident about the outcome of this project. Nevertheless, things turned out great. In fact, today we finished up the presentation, consisting in a Garage Band file we created a few days ago. And, although we didn’t have it completed for the beginning of class this morning, Mr. Chase received the final file thanks to Mithun, who spent all the remaining time working on the audio version of the script. Thankfully, despite the first misunderstandings with some of my group members, all of us did what we were supposed to do. Strangely however, we eventually decided to make audio version of the script, based on the audio version of the book itself. We did so because after a while we realized that half of us had pronunciation problems, and therefore we weren’t able to speak fluently and perform well.

Almost a week ago, we faced a technical difficulty: Naadir didn’t come to school that particular day, and we absolutely needed his part of the script. Unfortunately, he wasn’t even able to post them on the Google document. But, I knew he actually had them done on his laptop. So, after a couple of hours I lost hope, and decided that I had to find important lines we were missing, since I was the team manager. In that occasion I read the act in which the characters are waiting for Otello to arrive on the shore in Cyprus. I identified a very relevant line, which very few people noticed. I am talking about the one when Cassio takes Desdemona’s hand as an act of courtesy. It actually is an act of courtesy where Cassio comes from, but to the eyes of everyone else in Venice and Cyprus, it symbolizes a simple interest toward that specific woman. In essence, it can be interpreted as a Cassio’s mistake, by showing this supposed “attraction” for Desdemona. Today, I also found an interesting quotation from the writing Analysis of Iago, and it is the following: “However, it is not that Iago pushes aside his conscience to commit these acts, but that he lacks a conscience to begin with.” I have to say, I disagree with this statement. You see, if Iago does not have a conscience, why in almost every scene does he try to justify his immoral acts with pointless subterfuges and pretexts? I thought about the answer for a while, and I realized that by doing so, Iago shows to have a certain, although undefined conscience. 

Unfortunately, my optimism present in the first blog is now starting to turn in pessimism. During the last class, I worked with my group members on the criteria by which the lines need to be identified. Essentially, we realized that the passages that we pick up have to make sense once they will be part of our actual script. However, that’s not the reason why I am not confident anymore about the outcome of this project. The point is that I looked up on the google document the lines my partners chose, and, as far as I can tell, they are not related to jealousy, which of course is our theme, or very important for the plot. Furthermore, they are simply meaningless because they consist in just a few sentences with no context at all. In addition, the final script is due tomorrow, day during which Mithun will not be in class. Therefore I am not going to be able to talk to him directly. I already told him about what needs to be done, but so far there is just one line “done” in his section. Fortunately, Naadir has almost completed all the lines he has to do. I went over them, and he is doing a great job. Still, on Monday we eventually decided to present the project as a video. Mithun will take care of that later on, when everything will be ready. Anyway, while reading the book over and over to catch some passages that I probably missed, I figured out how everyone realized what kind of person Iago is just after he killed his wife Emilia. 

I think we can easily say that my group and me are perfectly on schedule in order to complete the script for the third of January. In fact, we picked a theme, jealousy, and we have obviously divided equally the work that needs to be done. Furthermore, pretty much all of my team members have already started to find the lines related to our theme, and the plot itself. Initially, I thought it would have been easy to work on this project as a group. Instead, I had a few difficulties in explaining to some of my partners how to identify the lines we need in order to form a good script. Now however, we are all set, and everybody knows exactly what to do. Nevertheless, we had a brief discussion about how to present the script. Initially we were thinking of an iMovie video, but then we realized that a podcast could be just as effective and valid. Eventually, we decided to create a video, but in case we meet any sort of technical difficulties, we will do the podcast instead. By reading the book more accurately, in order to find the lines related to jealousy, I realized that quite a lot of passages in the book has to do with our theme. Essentially, almost all the important lines can be interpreted so that the reader will identify the relevant theme as the jealousy.  

In the opinion of www.parissweethome.com, when Louis XIV was in power, the water supplies of Paris were managed neglectfully and the people suffered because of the consequential water shortage. In 1669, on the 26th of November, Sir Daniel Jolly began using the power of a mill, generated by the water flow of the Seine River, in order to offer more accessible water to the Parisians. This innovation consisted in a pump located underneath the Notre-Dame Bridge, which was able to supply 21 fountains and 81 taps. However, at the end of the XVIII century, thanks to filtration and decantation, the quality of water improved.
In 1778, the Périer brothers created the « Compagnie des eaux de Paris » (The Water Company of Paris). They wanted to make the water flow directly to houses and buildings by a series of pipes and channels.
Some decades later, Napoleon Bonaparte, the emperor, proposed to the prefect of the Seine River the production and distribution of water. He built the Ourcq Channel (that supplied 70000 m³ of water every day), the Grenelle artesian sink and sited a fountain in almost every garden of the houses. This solution guaranteed abundant supplying of water to the Parisians. On the other hand, the quality of the water wasn’t provided accordingly. Cholera and typhus epidemics lasted for months and decimated the population.
Eventually, in 1985, Paris entrusted the management and the distribution of water to the SUEZ Lyonnaise des Eaux Company. Today, Parisians have access to 1.000.000 m³ of water (about 52 gallons per inhabitant), which is distributed through a network of channels 1000 miles long.
As you just read, even centuries ago there were problems related to the supplying of potable water. It therefore isn’t an issue we don’t know about. Now, despite the XXI century technology, the water-borne diseases kill approximately 200.000 kids every year.

Today, have a constant and an almost unlimited access to water has become a normal condition for all of us. By now, opening the tap is a daily action for people living in wealthy countries. However, this effortless and simple deed has a long history, and, although the modern and advanced technologies, a huge number of people all over the world do not have access to water.
The water availability has always been pivotal and decisive, in order for a society to progress and grow. In the history of the human being, rivers and lakes represented the major, and technically the sole, water resource.
The most known and plain example is given by Mesopotamia and by what made it such a prosperous and fecund land. Mesopotamia was an ancient region of southwestern Asia, located between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. For centuries, it has been the greatest site of the culture of Akkad, Sumer, Babylonia, and Assyria. Nevertheless, the “Fertile Crescent” is basically what made this region so flourishing. In the opinion of www.about.com , the alluvial plains of the Fertile Crescent, or Fertile Half-moon, were the locations of some of the oldest civilizations in the history of the human species.
Some of them include the Assyrian, the Babylonians, the Sumerians, the Hittites, and the Egyptians. Furthermore, Ur, Nuzi, Babylon, Nineveh, Mari, Jericho, and Alalakh were the major and the wealthiest cities in the world known at that time.
However, this situation between men and water is now changing radically and that ancient harmony seems to have gone. Populations all over the world are in the middle of a crisis related to water never seen before in the whole history of the world.

The desertification is now expanding at a high rate, and it seems that it will not stop soon. Today, many areas are affected by this phenomenon. As stated by www.greencrossitalia.it , over the years, the 40% of the fertile lands became desert, typically as a result of drought, deforestation, or inappropriate agriculture.
If this situation doesn’t change, this process would be a possible threat for one sixth of the world population.
A UNEP (United Nations Environment Program) report states that about 1.900 millions acres are considered as barren lands, and more worrisome is the fact that 550 millions of that amount is located in Africa, where 65% of the territory is at risk. 
But don’t think that just Africa and other poor countries deal with such a dramatic issue, since also the US and EU are affected by it. As you can imagine, there is a relationship between the desertification and the wealth of a country. Therefore, it will not be possible for a country to raise its precarious condition if it doesn’t fix the problem related to the desertification before it’s too late. The reason why it’s necessary to act soon is simple. Fertilizing a land, after it has endured the desertification process, requires huge investments and consequently a substantial economic capital. 
You might now wonder why I wrote about the desertification of lands, while the title of this blog is “Lack of Potable Water”. I did so because, as you just read, one of the major causes of the desertification is indeed the drought. Ergo, we are not just dealing with barren and unfertile lands, but also with an abnormal low rainfall and a shortage of water resulting from it. That’s because the main lakes and rivers all over the world are reducing their capacity by considerable percentages. The scarcity of water is therefore related to many other issues you don’t even know about.

Just a few days ago, I was surfing the web, in order to search more information about the lack of potable water and all the topics related to it.
Eventually, I found something new that I didn’t know about.
Of course, the problems related to the supplying and the quantity of water catches the attention of the United Nations. However, I didn’t imagine that the UN would have been able to dedicate a day in name of the water. It is indeed called “The World Water Day” and is celebrated the 22nd of March. Its purpose is to make people, from all over the world, conscious about the importance and significance of saving this precious resource, water.
Sadly however, I am not sure about the results the United Nations achieved so far. I don’t know of anyone who is aware of the World Water Day, and probably a few seconds earlier, you were not as well. If the UN cannot accomplish good results, I don’t think I will do better.

As I recently reported, the topic I picked cannot be solved through a simply one action. Thinking about an actual operation would be relatively ineffectual too. I therefore realized that if people’s behavior changes, consequently, a huge result will be achieved. Think about it: if the majority of the persons all around the world would stop wasting billions of gallons of water, that same amount will be saved, obviously.
Although this proposal is ambitious and it would also be effective, convincing millions of people that saving water does make sense is not easy. Nevertheless, my Elevator Pitch will be very helpful in order to do so. I am very confident about it and about the people’s sense of responsibility.

I already stated that the lack of potable water causes every year the death of 200 million kids all over the world. Surprisingly, according to the Italian website www.tiscalinet.it , more than one billion people don’t even know what potable water is. Future considerations about the water issue aren’t very reassuring. Actually they are not reassuring at all: in about 20 years, 0.2 gallons of water will cost ten times more than 0.2 gallons of gasoline.
Thus, we shouldn’t feel surprised if the agriculture will be affected by this matter: irrigating the fields will not be convenient anymore. As a consequence the production of grain and certain kinds of food will be influenced in the same way.
Furthermore, as I already reported in the previous blog, in 2025 the world population will increase by 16%.
The production of cereals will have to increase accordingly. As a consequence the demand of meat and fish will grow. But breeding requires the agriculture in order to feed the animals, and in turn the agriculture necessitates water.
Researchers estimate that to face the resulting situation, the actual territory used for the agriculture will have to be expanded by 43.5 million hectares. Just think about the devastating impact it would have on the environment. Still, averagely, every day an American citizen consumes 171 gallons of water.
I believe all these data make us think that we should probably learn to manage water in a more thrifty way and to not waste it pointlessly. Nevertheless, the majority of people do so in developed and wealthy countries, where men and women don’t make any effort to save one of the most vital sources the nature gave us, which in the near future will be called “the blue gold.”

A worrisome problem related to the applications of water is fretting scientists and researchers all over the world. As stated by www.amicidelmondo.it, all over the world the consumption of the water can be allocated in the following way: 15% for domestic use, 60% for agricultural use and 25% embraces the industrial one.
Therefore water is not used solely by people to survive and wash their clothes. It is manly applied in the primary and secondary sector. Furthermore, because since the 60s the hydric consumption for the irrigation of fields is increased by 60%, today water has become a resource that is diminishing as time passes by.
Indeed experts and statisticians predict that in 2025, the world will begin to suffer very seriously because of the water shortage. The actual situation is already alarming: the world population amounts to about 6 billion people and the hydric availability for 1.4 billion of them is considered precarious.
Nevertheless, if 1.4 billion people have to deal with a critic situation, it doesn’t mean that the condition of the rest of the world population is superlative. In fact, the situation of another 2 billion people cannot be evaluated as sufficient, since it is only able to guarantee a minimum subsistence condition.
Unfortunately, things will get sensibly worse if they don’t change in the near future. During the fatal date, nudging 2025, the water will be a mirage for almost 3 billion people over the 7 billion our world will amount. In just twenty years the percentage of the thirsty persons will go up from 25% to 40%.
It will not be easy to live in such a reality. But we better learn to do so, without complaining or wondering, “how did that happen?” We will be responsible for that, no one else will.