Necessities

In the last couple of weeks I have had to revisit the meaning of the word “necessity” over and over. Three weeks ago the geyser for our hot water broke out of the blue. This was the number one luxury in my life—a bathtub with hot baths inside the house! Before I moved to this rural area and was living nearby a town with plus or minus 300,000 I didn’t even have water indoors. So you can imagine the irony when I moved to the deep rural village and I was living in luxury. Anyways, the breaking of the geyser has forced me back to boiling my water with a kettle and bucket bathing. This still isn’t too bad because I still have a bathtub and so I won’t spill water all over my floor, which is what I hate the most about the process before.

Two weeks ago the electric plug in the kitchen broke, forcing us to make do with using one electrical appliance in the kitchen at a time. Which you wouldn’t think would be difficult, except when there are 6 people jockeying for position in trying to boil water for the bath and or make dinner.

Last week the plug in my room broke. It actually caused a very mini and seconds long fire (more like a spark explosion) and a horrible shock to my arm, causing it to go numb for several hours (don’t worry I’m fine!). This meant that I could no longer use electric items in my room. You really don’t realize your dependency on this stuff until it is gone. For me the hardest part was the lack of a heater. The inside of my house is now usually a frosty 45-50 degrees and with no central heating a standing, plug-in heater is a must.

Today I got the electricity back in my room when an Mkhulu (Grandfather) from the village came over and fixed it for me. I was actually really worried it wouldn’t be fixed for a long time because of the “Africa time” sensation that is an issue in every part of my life. Generally it should have taken about a month to get fixed (for various reasons, mainly just getting someone out here to do it) but since I asked to have myself reimbursed from my good old American bosses, my supervisor saw that there was more of a schedule that we were on. I am very thankful for her on most days because she really does look out for me when it counts.

Today the kettle for the hot water broke (this is an electric kettle that you plug in—it cuts the time down to about 6 minutes to boil a pot full of water—essential for bathing 6 people 2x a day). I doubt it will be fixed any time soon, meaning that I will have to get in line about an hour before my bath to boil my water on the stove (once the food is finished). Also, the generator that we are all depending on at work for computers to work while we wait to have the electricity installed broke this week, meaning that my house is the new home office.

Over all, I would say that none of these things (except the generator, we need that badly) will probably be fixed while I am in South Africa. In part due to money and other parts due to the fact that we live in a rural area and it’s just hard to get things together and fixed.

Strangely enough for me, the queen of impatience, I don’t really mind about this rash of inconvenient occurrences. I actually didn’t lose my temper or anything, which old Therese probably would have done after the first appliance, the geyser, broke (it’s cold here! Bucket bathing is not a fun task in the winter).

My situation is so much better than the majority of my village—which has no electricity. While my village is somewhat close to town (20 KM) most of the people do not have either water or electricity. It is strange to be so close to “civilization” (aka KFC and a supermarket) but have no modern conveniences available. One of my favorite coworkers goes to bed at 7pm every night because she doesn’t have electricity and it is freeeeeezing because she lives in a mud building (they are terrible in the winter). I can’t imagine cooking my water on an outside fire or sleeping at 7pm and waking at 5am. We have frequent power outages because the electricity in my area is not very strong so it does not seem to withstand very much rain or wind. Every time that happens I am just really depressed because I just go to sleep at 7. That for a life would make me sad.

All I can say is that whenever I go to a backpacker’s youth hostel type place I savor the showers and the warm rooms and laundry machines. I don’t think it will be possible back in the states to ever look at my life or how I live the same ever again. Because in the US I will always have electricity and water and won’t have to wait an hour and a half for a taxi, making a 20 minute trip turn into a 2.5 hour adventure (like what happened today). I think that my future children are doomed to me coming back at complaints with: “well in Africa…they don’t even have. [insert blank here]”