World Water Day on Thursday comes at a time where South Africa is facing one of its worst water shortages to date. Cape Town has been on the brink of a drought and has been enforcing stringent water restrictions in order to push back the dreaded "Day Zero".
This year's World Water Day theme is "Nature for Water" to encourage people to "look for the answer in nature".
And while the thought of water running out is scary and potentially deadly, there are also fun and interesting things to know about the liquid we can't live without.
1. Water is sticky. The molecules love to stick to things, especially one another. It's what gives it such a large surface tension. It keeps you alive: it means water can pull blood up narrow vessels in the body, often against the force of gravity.
2. Did you know it takes 50 litres of water to produce one orange? When we waste food, we also waste the resources that went into producing it.
3. To manufacture new cars, 53,000 to 84,000 litres of water is used per car.
4. In 2016, UNICEF said 200-million hours are spent daily by women and girls in underdeveloped areas to collect water — a "colossal waste of their valuable time".
5. Hot water can freeze faster than cold water under some conditions (commonly known as the Mpemba effect). The Mpemba effect is named after Erasto Batholomeo Mpemba who discovered it in 1963. There are ancient accounts of similar phenomena, but the detail is insufficient to verify.
