It could be a great idea if I would live inside our river near me
One of my fantasies to is live at the center of the river for a much quieter environment, fresh air, and free food that I can trap at he convenience of my abode.
In the old times here in my country you can notice that administrative building and churches are near the river. It is because there are not much good roads back then and one of the major transportation hi-ways where people can use to trade, travel faster, and go to places at a much more ease are the rivers even those small canals that are now had been shallow due to natural erosion and sediment deposition if not those trash and debris that accumulate over time. But the river near our house here is deep and has a current going down at the north part of our province because it is lower there and branches out to the Manila bay as well.
But over the years the rivers also had gotten shallow in some parts making the traversing quite difficult especially with bigger boats. Also, not much ports for such boats for use to exit people from, and not much services to transport goods to nearby towns and cities. The boats are just parked to more often beside the private lands as people who live near the supposed government owned property at the riverbank claims it now as their own.
So now people would build fences by the river bank and other people will have no more access to these river banks. That is why the river near my village is so pristine with its waters, the water is relatively clean and closer to the main water source, the "Angat" Dam. But the tributaries of the river is also its surrounding land because the water table here is low, meaning if you dig a few feet down the water will already seep through and if it is raining, just a foot only deep with some simple digging it will be impossible not to see water. So the artesian pump wells are easier to pump and depending on how deep the pipe of these wells penetrate the soil or ground which is composed of clay and or rocks as you go deeper the more cleaner it gets and good enough to drink the water from it directly.
The water in our nearby river also harbors Tiger prawns, it is one of the naturally thriving marine life that you can harvest without any regulations, all you have to do is to have the means and or manpower to catch them, they have a very nice market value all because they are rare to be seen in the fish market. One can live off them if they are resourceful and skillful enough to catch these marine treasure from our river.
River clams also are plentiful in the river floor and the beach near or inside the water of the river. You can just feel them with your hands and after a few hours you can bring home a night's meal from them if you make them a clam soup with ginger, raw papaya perhaps and with wild spinach or Moringa leaves or even sweet potato greens for an added nutrition. There are so much wild greens that you can use that grows in vacant lots or spaces so if you realize it, you can save much money by just picking you leafy vegetables from the wild to incorporate with your free clams for a very nutritious dish.
Our river here is known for its big Tiger prawns which is made into a specialty dish in a resort two villages away from my village.
Then of course you can just trap some fish from your boat at the center of the river, all you have to do is to put whatever bait you want to put inside a cage or cages where some fish would come in and to eat and then get trapped because of that inward door in one or all four sides of the fish trap. Alternatively I can also trap fresh water river crabs down below on the surface of the sand and hopefully catch some Tiger shrimps in the process. These "fruits" from the river as I have said commands a high price in the public market and there are people who like to eat them and since you get them for free you can sell them for a more reasonable price or cheaper for neighbors who wants them.
So why have gotten to think about living at the center of the river? I don't think that I will be requiring to pay taxes by just living in a big boat or even a spruced-up raft for that matter, besides my Town's municipal government aren't keen to force townsfolk to pay their property taxes because for that thing the mayor are just afraid to lose votes from his constituents which is why when people makes a financial request for whatever reason the Mayor is compelled to give them assistance even for a payment of some pachyderm people's electricity bills.
For the second reason of it seems that it is peaceful to live like a nomad at the center of the river, you do not have to contend with living around neighbors who are not good neighbors like a bunch of Karens and Maritesses that would bother you in some ways more than one. Then being in a quiet environment surrounded by calm river will definitely give you some forms of good mental therapy because you are far from noise and stresses of living near to the road or noisy and nosey neighbors.
Even though living off-grid at the center of the river will require a good amount of cash to cough out and require a little know-how in making things work or fixing and all that maintenance job, it has also the benefits of being peaceful, could be also more secure, better for your mental health, and you get the perks of utilizing the waters to harvest some free food that you can consume and also sell for money that you can use for your other needs and necessities.
But I am just fantasizing about living off-grid or semi-off-grid but it seems a very good idea if happen to make it work, you can go in some parts of the river too in some schedule or special days to let you experience different kinds of views and environments making the way you live or your newly peculiar lifestyle more interesting because of being mobile all the time because you live in a basically floating house that is almost complete for your necessities and some extra items for your entertainment, work, and pleasure.
The only issue is that some people will copy on what you are doing and in time making the river saturated of people, polluting the waters and alarming the government which in turn disband or make this kind of living illegal. So you have to mitigate even before planning it so you will not see yourself in a precarious situation in the process.
Not all people prefer to live in a boat at the center of a river but in may case it is a fantasy that I would like to do if given the option and means necessary to make it happen.