Below is a link to and excerpts from an interview with Selco, a Bosnian, who survived a year behind a war blockade. They had no government services, no supplies were brought it, no food, no water, no electricity. Money was worthless.
He says many things that I have already thought and may have mentioned in previous posts. Food is almost as important for morale as it is for nutrition. Sure rice and beans will keep you alive, but it won’t keep you happy for long. Store foods you LIKE to eat along side the staples to make those items stretch. You can only eat so many cans of green beans or packages of mountain house before you go nuts.
Also, learn how to and set up a water catchment system now, rather than wait till supplies are scarce. Not to mention other useful skills you can trade. You can help your neighbors more if you are prepared, get them set up now as well or help them if the time comes rather than waiting for them to take yours.
Get to know the people you plan to batten down the hatches with. That way you have less surprises when something happens.
Be prepared to set your ego aside, or your feminism, or your machismo, or whatever your hangup that current society has allowed you to foster and remember that the good of the group comes first.
via What an “Average Day” Is REALLY Like When the SHTF – The Organic Prepper
“To explain it more, when you have a lot of people in a small area (city) and you have less resources that are needed for that number of people, the fact that you HAVE something (food, water medicines…) needs to be hidden from people who do not have that.
The system (law, police, etc.) was out, and it was important not to give reasons for people to attack you because you have something interesting.”
“I believe it was the biggest problem when it came to meals, the lack of bread, simply because we used to eat it a lot.
It was kinda a psychological problem for us too, not to have enough bread.
That was first biggest change.
Note: do not underestimate the power that food has not only in calorie terms but also in psychological terms. Having and eating food that you love makes things much easier. Store food in your prepper storage that you LIKE to eat.”
“People do not understand how much hard work is needed to get done things like water, food, heat, security because the system is here for us to take care of those things, so we do not have to.
We were ordinary city folks who did not have a lot of knowledge about stuff like how to go find a tree, take it down, chop it into small pieces, and bring it home somehow. Or how to collect water from rain, or bring enough water from the river when that is impossible.”
“When the system is out, way too much time is needed to take care of everyday needs.
If we had enough food, we did not have enough rain for water so we took trips to the river. If we had enough water then someone had a serious case of diarrhea and we were worried about that.
Not to downplay the physical threat, but preppers today usually focus only on the physical threat, on fighting, weapons, and similar, while there is much more to everyday survival. “
“Through the socialistic-communist society doctrine (in society before the war) it was strongly pushed that females and males were equal in any field of life, and people had that kind of mentality built.
But when the SHTF, pretty soon a traditional way of life jumped in. Women were staying home, taking care of kids and food, and men were going out more actively.
It was not rule, but it was usual.
Usually, women were the ones who knew how to make food from something that did not look like real food or to make it edible, or to comfort sick or frightened kid.
Women were the pillar of everything.
I would say that we simply did things that each one of us was best in. It was not democraty. The person (not necessary the oldest) who had most organizational skills was in charge, simply because it make sense like that. Duties were divided between other members based on skills, strength, and sense of fairness.”
Read more of Selco’s articles here: https://shtfschool.com/blog/
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