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"It is the rainy season in East Africa, brought in by monsoon winds.  Torrential rains fall and beat on the rooftops in Addis Ababa.  Water rushes through Kibera's open trench sewers.  Water races to channels blocked with flood debris and laps back frantic for a new path.  Water washes away soil, a finger grip for roots, gone.  And when the big rain season silences, gone too will be the water.  Drought's voice will crackle again. Water is not scarce in Africa; what is scarce is water infrastructure, a way to harvest what floods and then vanishes.  According to the IRIN of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, Kenya's capital city, Nairobi, has the capacity to provide for the water needs of 6-10 million people, over twice its current population, supplying each person with 60 liters of water a day if rainwater were efficiently harvested.  Today, only 21 thousand people are currently served by Nairobi's existing water system.  Add to the natural cycle of weather, global climate change, more floods, more droughts, more lives in jeopardy, and you have a totally predictable disaster.  The good news is that rainwater harvesting does not require billions of dollars; it does not require international conventions.  Connecting a pipe to a barrel, capturing rainwater when and where it falls, can provide water resources at the community level.  Rain is beating on the rooftop.  Listen to what it is saying."