In this episode, the Green Rapper heads to Redwood Creek in Marin County to talk water quality with Doug Kern. Doug is a scientist and teacher who is involved with restoration of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area. Doug shows us how to collect critical data about this precious resource. Find out how clean your tap water is compared with filtered water and water from a creek. Also, the Green Rapper finally gets confronted on his bathroom manners and then freestyles about it.

Here are the results of our water quality monitoring:

As a Peace Corps volunteer in the Dominican Republic, I used to take bucket baths and pour a bucket of water into the toilet to flush in lieu of running water. I had to chase down cistern trucks just like everyone else and then carry buckets of water indoors. Various government aqueduct projects came and went, and after two years passed, I really wanted to do something about the problem. Though I had neither the resources nor the time to build an aqueduct, I was able to borrow a video camera from a fellow volunteer and shoot a documentary to raise awareness.

My goal was to spread word about the precarious water situation in the community where I lived. After returning to the states, I edited the documentary, sent it around, and posted it to Google Video. Later, a friend of mine in Oviedo, D.R informed me that the water situation had improved. I don’t believe my documentary had much effect, but it was screened at several film festivals and perhaps helped some Americans become aware of their water use. Here is the video: