Welcome to today's Water Talk. I am Ryan Dellamater, the founder of Ocean Water. Today
I have my friend Al with me. And Al, why don't you just tell everybody a little bit about yourself?
Sure. Yep, thanks for having me on this. So my name's Al. I'm currently a PhD student at Yale,
doing a joint program in anthropology and environmental studies. So just getting started in my PhD
program during a pandemic is interesting. It is definitely a unique experience. But it's going
really well so far, all things considered. And so yeah, in a nutshell, that's what I'm kind of
working on now. Oh, that's wonderful. So Al and I met at the MIT Water Summit. We had a chance to
learn from a lot of wonderful people there. And Al, why don't you tell, you mentioned that you are
a PhD student at Yale. And can you tell everybody where that's located? And also can you tell everyone
when you're doing research these days, what's your favorite thing to eat?
Sure. So Yale is in New Haven, Connecticut in the northeast. So it's interesting moving there again
in the middle of the pandemic. I haven't been able to explore as much as I wanted to. And now I'm back
in the Carolinas visiting family. So thinking about where to eat during research, I guess,
if I was at Yale, there are a bunch of food trucks near where I live. And it's awesome because
there's a Thai food truck, and it's close to where I live, and it's cheap. And I'm half Thai as well.
So getting kind of like a taste of home in the middle of New England is always really, really
nice. So that's kind of my go-to. And they're surprising. Oh, and New Haven pizza. The pizza's
great. Even though I'm lactose intolerant, they have a bunch of great pizza options. So they have
a lot of great pizza options. So definitely people from New Haven have a very strong preference for
which pizza place they love. And if you go there, that's the one thing I think you must try.
Wonderful. Now, I love Thai food. I love Thai. I love curry. Yeah. So where are you originally from?
Yeah. So I was born in Singapore. I'm half Thai. I grew up there for a fair bit. I moved to Australia
for a few years. And then from Australia, I moved to the US. So I did my high school in South Carolina,
in all places, right outside Charlotte. And I went back to Singapore to do the army. I
met the college masters and here I am. So I've been around a little bit. Well, that is wonderful. I'm
really, really honored to get to talk to you today. And so as far as your research goes,
I mean, we're never done researching and learning, but as far as your thesis or your dissertation,
do you feel like you're in the beginning, the middle or the end?
Definitely the beginning. It's on average about a six year or so program in the US. It's a little
shorter in the UK. So part of being in the US, it gives me a little more leeway in terms of time to
work on the project. So being my first year, it's a great time to think about my project really
carefully and figure out how I'm going to proceed to do this, write up my kind of perspective
and head into the field. And with the current COVID situation, it's even more difficult because
my research is trying to look at smart cities and water infrastructure in Laos. And so I can't really
go there. The country's closed at this point. So hopefully in summer things clear up and I'm able
to head down there because for an anthropologist being on the ground is like one of the most
important things. And so definitely the beginning parts of the research, thinking a lot about
how I'm going to proceed given the current situation, but also in terms of the project
in general, making sure my research design is kind of well designed before I head there and
do my research full time on the ground.
No, very, very exciting. Wow. So cool. So a lot of learning and research and being in the academic
world, the research world, the science community has to do with being curious. And so I know that
you and I are both obviously curious about water. We are forming a friendship around that subject
that I hope will last a long time because water is quite a problem as we look around the world on a
lot of levels. So what is something that you're curious about or interested in that doesn't have
anything to do with water? What are just some things you're curious about?
Right. Too many things. I think one of my advisors in undergraduate made a comment once and said,
given an analogy that I was like a crow and when there was a shiny object, I would go to that and
get distracted really easily. And while the curiosity is great for a capstone, for an
undergraduate level or for a PhD project, it's necessary to kind of focus in. So water is kind
of my thing in a sense for my larger project, but so many, so many things that I'm curious about.
And I think that's part of kind of a liberal arts education as well. So in undergraduate,
there's a ton, for example, I was really interested in education, just thinking about the role of
education and what that means, something I really wanted to do. And so I think that's
taken up in my own kind of understanding of education and positionality is this idea of
social labor. So this idea that sure, we might, whatever school we go to and whatever educational
status we have, it's not really a badge of merit in so much as a representation of the social
labor that's gone into it. Right. I could not have been here without the support of family, friends,
and community at large. And so in doing that, I mean, it's super important for me to always
keep connected and to recognize that it's not just me that's doing this. It's a kind of community
that goes behind that and to not obfuscate this kind of badge of merit as an individual thing,
but really kind of like connected to all these other processes and even privileges and to be
aware and reflexive about those. So I think that's something super important to me, always really
interested in education. I almost went into work in education instead of this academic power.
So that's something that's always been close to heart. And there's a lot more urban theory,
the idea of space, anthropological theory, and yeah, it goes on. Quite a long list, but yeah,
happy to be up, happy to talk about most of that on any day. That's awesome. Well, I like what you
said, you know, because what you shared was really rooted in humility. And, you know, a lot of the
opportunity in life we have to be responsible for. So I like what you shared. I sensed a lot
of humility there and a lot of responsibility in your voice with wanting to be a good steward of
the opportunity that you've been given. That's what we're supposed to do. We're supposed to be
good stewards with the opportunities that have been presented to us. So very, very cool. That's
very, very exciting. So we met, we focused, you know, on our interests are in water. And part of
what I feel, you know, goes into being a good leader, a good influencer, whatever that means now.
And to me, what that means is that we all have influence on some level. And so the question
becomes, what do we do with that influence? And so, you know, there's, it's important to be,
to use our influence in a good way. Part of using our influence in a good way is being self-aware.
And being self-aware has to do with analyzing our mistakes. So one of my favorite questions to ask
is, what is something that you feel like you might have done wrong in the last year that you would
like to talk about? Sometimes we do things. So many things. And I feel like it's to have,
for one thing to come through, there were a lot of failures that preceded that. So a ton of failures.
And I guess failure, it's always a relational term. Like something that might seem like a success to
someone else might be a failure on some level, to a very specific extent. So there's a lot. And
to, I mean, usually this question I would get in terms of like a job interview, like what is a
failure and how can I show like a narrative that demonstrates a strength or something or pitch it
that way? But I think for me, in terms of failures, there's just, to just take the question a little
bit of a different spin, it's just, for example, not getting a lot of fellowships and scholarships
that I wanted to get and wondering like, how did I fail? When did I fail? And I mean, to some extent,
it might not be personal. It might not be entirely a case of, oh, it's kind of a linear metric of
merit. It may be a matter of fit. And I mean, there's all these ways of rationalizing it. But
I think in terms of failure, like not getting a fellowship that I really wanted, well, okay. So
it's, I think for all of them, I just kind of got to the point where it's like, I need to find,
figure out good outlets to and a good community to figure out what to do when I fail at something.
And for people to be there and just be like, oh, okay, let's go watch a movie or hang out,
talk about something else. And like, there's this always this kind of weird feeling of like,
oh, did I not do well enough or something like that? And just to figure out where I stand
in relation to that. And it's not a kind of panacea. Like failure is never easy to grapple
with, I think, and not getting fellowship. I'm like, well, I didn't get something I really wanted.
And it's been everything from like either other PhD positions that I applied to. I mean, that's
just the case. And if Yale didn't come through, it might be, you know, and nothing else came through,
what do I do with myself? Right? And what can I do with myself? And Yale came through kind of
later than other failures. So it was kind of, yeah, something, a lot of things I feel that in
terms of applications, in terms of missteps along the way. And I think for me, it's interesting to
think about what to do in response to that. And to recognize the inevitability of like, well,
failure isn't gonna be fun, but what do I do? And who do I have around to kind of walk through that
journey with? It sounds kind of semi philosophical, but it's just basically like failures aren't great.
Having a community to walk through that is super key. And I think in terms of the pandemic,
it's been even more important and intentional to cultivate those relationships, especially
in a super intellectual environment in a PhD program.
Yeah, I love that. And I have a joke with my, with some close friends that failure is fondly referred
to as learning opportunities. So we all have plenty of learning opportunities in our life.
That's really funny. And I like what you said about, you know, just having the right people
around you. I just had this conversation this morning. There's a friend of mine that I serve
with quite a bit. And today, it was 40, 45 degrees on the beach, but the the wind chill factor was
much colder than that. And we were sitting in the car, and the car had like warm seats. And I was
looking at the waves, and I was not looking forward to it at all, actually today. And but my buddy,
he got us out there. And, you know, there's something to be said for having the right people
around you that are that enable you to, you know, to do well. So very, very cool. Let's
take a take a bit of a right. And let's talk a bit about the world of water kind of what got you
interested in the water sector.
Yeah, so this, um, this came from my research in undergraduate when I ended up in a village. So
at that point, I was working with my advisor and talking about the ways we can do ethnographic work
in a village. And so for me, I got connected with a friend of friend with friend and ended up in a
village in Northern Thailand. And so I went to do community work there to just kind of have a chat
about what's what's going on there and for a couple hours. And so the recurring theme or the main
theme of what the main takeaway I had was, we have a water problem. And so in Thai, it's, oh, we have
a banh hand up now. So like, literally, we have problem with water. And I'm like, what is this
problem? And I'm like, well, we turn on the tab, there's no water. I'm like, okay. So interesting.
So I, I framed my research project in undergraduate around this water problem, which was
central in this particular village when, when job came around, and particularly severe drought,
people turn on their water, and there's just no water. So what is, how do you think, how can we
think about this? And so reading into literature, kind of talking to a bunch of people across the
village, living in the village for a couple of weeks. And so that's kind of my first introduction
to water. And the next year I worked, just happened to work with a friend, get connected with, through
a friend to this, to this lab in Chiang Mai. And it was the opposite of a drought, it was a flood.
So we were looking at ways, it was a kind of a lab, a month long conference sort of thing,
where we got academics, practitioners, policymakers to come together to work towards this issue of
flooding in the city and in Chiang Mai. And so opposite of drought, not too far from my original
field site, but water in a different sense. So I was engaged to like help with translations,
interviews, talking to various people, and doing an art exhibition as well, and a range of things
around the idea of water. So I guess that was kind of several ways into the world of water.
People telling me that's a big problem they had and kind of like relating to that in that way and
working in the research field with other really, really interesting folks as well.
Well, our experiences have been similar. My
experience was in some villages in Fiji and also in El Salvador. And what's interesting is,
you know, water is, there can be a quality problem in cities, but there's an access problem in
villages. And so you brought up a great point talking about Thailand. And that is one of the
108 countries of the world that have a direct ocean access. And so, you know, I think that's
the biggest problem. And so, you know, I think that's the biggest problem. And so, you know,
there's a lot of people in the world that have a direct ocean access. And so, there's opportunity
to have discussions about some of the work that we do, you know, some of the work that we do
on small-scale solar power desalinization projects, which I believe is going to be the future of water
in many ways, because the large centralized systems that built the last 100 years have,
you know, sort of gotten us to where we are, but they've also left quite a few people out. In fact,
probably nearly a billion people in the world still have an access problem. And it's quite a
big problem. What's accelerating this problem too is the population growth now. So not only is it
currently arguably a billion person problem, but we're supposed to add another billion people in
the next 30 years, according to the math guesstimates. So there are a lot of conversations
to be had. It's one of the reasons why I enjoy doing these talks, you know, for guys like you and
I who think about this subject a lot. It's front and center for us. But I like to have these
conversations with friends like yourself, because it helps include people into part of the bigger
discussion, especially when we start to think about the real problems of the world. In my opinion,
the real problems of the world mostly have to do with water, food and housing. And there are other
serious problems, but most problems take a backseat to water, food and housing.
Those are quite large problems that we still have. So what do you know about, you know, like
some of the work that I do or small scale desalinization? What are some of your thoughts on
that? Yeah, I think that's super important. It's great to see the work that you're doing and
creating these or enhancing really like water access points for people who need water. I think
that's a really clear need and a global problem. So know that the work that you're doing is fantastic
and in terms of the mechanics of small scale water desalinization, it's interesting in so much as
so coming from Singapore, growing up in Singapore, we had one of the big kind of existential problems
for Singapore since independence was water. And thinking about how we can get water from Malaysia,
and there's still political tensions today of how that happens. But what Singapore has done
in the past number of decades is to create more taps and diversified sources so that it's
politically importantly, not so dependent on any one particular source. If that taps off,
that's it, the country has no water. So what Singapore has done is to kind of
spread out and diversify sources, one of which is new water. And so
when I was in elementary school, I remember the water is this kind of desalination plant
using coilet water. No, sorry, not desalination. So desalination is separate, but this kind of
filtration method using coilet water. So thinking about that when we were in elementary school, and
we had to drink the water on a field trip, we're not huge fans of it, but it's become kind of
normalized in society in Singapore today. So it's kind of widespread. So desalination is one thing
that's of course doing, but that's not enough. And so we've had to think about other methods of water
to create potable water and new water is one of them and recycling water that way. So
desalination kind of like in Singapore can't work on a small scale because of the ways that
Singapore is just kind of the political system of Singapore and the kind of needs of the country.
So that's kind of how I've grown up thinking about water and experiencing it and ideas of
desalination. And I remember talking about this in elementary school about the importance of
desalination as a country and how this is an existential problem. Yeah, it's a fascinating
sector to focus in. It's very interesting to do work in this market. It's a large market.
And it's something that I became really passionate about because I've surfed since I was a kid.
And so when I started doing my research for public health, something clicked with me. It made perfect
sense to me that we would try to secure some of our water rights from the ocean, which is quite
nice because nobody owns the ocean, not yet. So yeah, it's very interesting. And yeah, I've
really enjoyed this conversation that we've had today. And I can't thank you enough for
taking the time to talk with me and to begin a friendship. And I believe life is about
friendships and the people that you meet, the conversations that you have. And so thank you
for just allowing me to have some time with you. And I'm very, very excited about the work that
you're doing at Yale. I'm very excited about the PhD that you're working on. And who knows? Maybe
our paths will cross someday and we can find a small pocket of people to serve in Thailand. I
would be very, very interested in that. My passion these days are for the marginalized communities.
And what I mean when I say that are segments of people that are like about a thousand people or
less. I really, really enjoy doing work in those areas and we can keep each other's contact
information and perhaps we can do some work together in the future. That'd be quite wonderful.
And so one of the things that I like to do to end these talks is, are there any last words
that we need to hear from you, brother? What do you got for us? What do we need to hear from you?
Oh, I'm not sure I have any wise words per se. I mean, I was thinking about how to, what would
I say that is relevant and thinking about people's involvement. So like listening to a podcast and
things like this, like what can I do if I'm interested in water? What can I do to get involved?
And I think it doesn't, well, water is a great, and there are many axes to get involved in terms
of water, access and wherever that is. I think it's important to find something that clicks
and personally something in the locality. And for me, it's just being able to serve in the
locality and just being involved in that. And even though like I'm traveling, relocate every year at
this point or every other year, it's important for me to get to know the local community in some
sense and try to be able to serve them, whether it's water or not. And I think figuring that out,
especially during the pandemic and seeing what needs can be met is something that is close to
my heart. And Yale is one of, New Haven is one of the most segregated cities in the world.
The most segregated communities, I think, and as I'm kind of held in kind of social science
literature is one of the places to study what went wrong to a certain extent. And to think about how
to get involved in that community is something that I've been trying to think about and get
involved with when I'm there. So in terms of what I can recommend people thinking about,
and whether that's water, just to figure out whether it's water or not, like something that
resonates with you and to get involved in that, in whatever you constitute as community, whether
that's kind of in your locality or people you connect with far away and contributing
to those causes that way. I think practice is a huge part of my life and I'd love for it to be
more. And so I guess if I have anything to say, either just finding something that resonates and
thinking about practices and working together with people. Yeah. And I'll keep it at that.
Well, that was very wise. I mean, that was, you said a lot there and that's exactly what's kept me
going back to Palmar Cedar in El Salvador where we built our friendships and our relationships
and installed a small-scale desalinization system there. That's what keeps me going back. I've been
there 14 times now and that's what keeps me going back are the people. And so as you said,
find a context and find a project and some people that you really enjoy and you can spend some time
there. So, well, thank you so much for your time today, Al. I really appreciate it. Thanks for your
friendship and we'll see you in touch. Yeah. Okay. Have a great day, brother.
Thank you so much. Thanks for having me. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you. Okay. Bye-bye.