Life in Coco: A Bull in a China Shop

(This entry was started Monday evening…and I just now finished…oh, good intentions)

I wasn’t going to make this list because I’m slightly embarrassed. But after this morning, I was so ticked off I just didn’t care, and then as the day passed, I began to see the humor in it all. So I figure it is time to get it all down in written form.

Before Ed and Andrea left for the States they told me, “If anything breaks, no problem, just send us an email, so if we need to replace it in the States we can do so.” And like any good house sitter, I assured them that I would make it my goal to never have to write such an email. About three days later I sent them an email asking some questions about some things that I had forgotten. I cleverly wrote in the subject line, “Don’t worry, nothing broke.”

Famous last words.

Since then, I’ve been a non-stop wrecking ball. I regularly keep the other missionaries entertained with my ever-lengthening list of casualties around the house. I’ve written several apologetic emails to E&A explaining “what broke now.” Then, I have to have “confession time” with B&D, the mishs here that are in charge of all the maintenance for the hospital and houses. It’s rather humiliating. (So I might as well air it all my on-lookers.)

But before I spell out this list, let me just give a few words of explanation in my defense.
1. I don’t feel like I’m a particularly destructive person. A little clumsy at times, sure, but not maliciously destructive.
2. Hate to admit it, but I’m just not that strong. I mean, some of these “accidents” could be explained if I just was underestimating my own strength. Alas, I’m no Clark-Kent-turned-Superman.
3. Cheap Chinese crap. This is a widely known and accepted saying here in Coco. Not to debate the merits of Chinese products, but it seems that a lot of available hardware around here is poorly fabricated.
4. It is possible that E&A timed their vacation at just the right time for all of these things to break. Like a ticking time-bomb, their house has chosen to detonate while in my care.

Alright, here’s the stinking list:

1. The pool. E&A have (had?) a pool that they asked me to take care of while they were gone. It’s a nice little thing (underground even) in their backyard that they resurrected from 18 years of non-use when they bought the house. When I arrived, the kids were swimming in the pool daily, the water was mostly clear, and it was an inviting scene. Before E left, he gave me detailed instructions on how to manage the pool. They left and that evening I went to filter the pool; however, the water level was too low and the filter was pulling a lot of air. E had told me that he added water almost every day (but he didn’t tell me how much). So I added water instead of filtering that day. The pool still looked good. That weekend I filtered all day, swept the pool, added chlorine, but didn’t get in. The water started getting cloudy. Sunday morning I found two dead, swollen lizards floating in the pool. Monday, the pool started turning green. I desperately added more chlorine. Tuesday, I couldn’t see the bottom except in the shallow end. I could not (and still do not) understand what I had done wrong, except every day I would have to add water for an hour or so before I could turn on the filter. It was just really leaking. A week after they had left, E&A’s pool looked like some green space alien. I thought it might possibly grow legs. However, I continued to valiantly fight the battle. After two weeks, the rest of the missionaries convinced me that it was time to call it quits. (After all, I was only wasting water, chemicals, and electricity.) I wrote my “sorry” email to E. The pool now sits, empty and uninvitingly in the backyard and has become a receptacle for rain water.

2. The washing machine. They did explain that it was “on its last leg,” and had some “quirks.” But four days after they left, the washing machine quit working. Luckily, D—missionary super-handyman—was able to play with wiring and resurrect it from the dead.

3. The bird. They have this little parakeet in a cage that sits back by the pool, hanging from a mango tree. (It was almost disgustingly picturesque…) I arrived home one afternoon, a week after they had left, to screams coming from the backyard. I rushed in to find Elizabeth (housekeeper) and a neighbor boy pushing the bird back into its cage. It wasn’t too pleased and was biting both of them. Having contained the creature, they walked away, muttering something about “stupid birds” and not knowing how it got out. How did they catch it? A quick survey of the backyard painted the picture well for me. The hose, the tree, the water marks in the dirt. A quick look at the bird brought it all to completion. Wet, half featherless, hanging upside down in its cage, hissing. I mean, I got to hand it to Elizabeth, if you lose a bird in a tree, a neighbor boy and a hose aren’t bad ways of retrieving it. I was sure the bird would die. It didn’t move for most of the next three days—just huddled on its perch and then occasionally hanging upside down, always hissing. It has since regrown most of its plumage and seems to be living happily.

4. The pool filter. I had to drain the pool, but the trick to this is that drain-feature on the filter pushes the water through a pipe that goes under my wall and into the street. This isn’t exactly a problem, except that it ends up flooding the front of my neighbor’s house (slightly problematic for neighborly relationships…after all, you never know when you’ll need one of his kids to catch your bird). I was attempting to move the filter/pump back a couple inches so that I could slip a flexible blue hose into that pipe, so as to drain the water into my yard, when a PVC pipe connecting the filter and pump snapped in two. I swear I wasn’t pulling that hard. Another job for D…

5. My borrowed moto. It’s one thing when you break your own vehicle, it’s another when it is someone else’s. One evening shortly after I had parked my moto and come inside, the guard came to get me and told me the moto was leaking gas. It certainly was, but it seemed like a simple fix—a disconnected hose. Felt really good about this “fix” till the next morning when it wouldn’t start at all. I had apparently connected two air vents that were leaking because the carburetor was blown. Again, D…

6. My front gate. This was just a few days ago. The metal plate that articulates with the dead bolt on the gate’s frame was warped. Then someone got physical with it and it snapped. Guess who got to fix that… Yep, D…

7. The bunny. Have I mentioned that E's middle daughter, L, is an animal lover? I, however, am obviously not meant to have pets. Yesterday I go out to feed the bunny, who had previously seemed so happy and healthy, and he is dead. Are you kidding me right now? I buried it in the backyard, trying to count the blessing of not having to give up all my lettuce to the hungry little bugger. [You animal lovers out there will be happy to know that Elizabeth, quite unprompted I assure you, bought another rabbit on Wednesday. I have no idea why, or frankly, what she was thinking when she did. It is not even the same color and has floppy ears as opposed to the straighter ears of the other one. If it was a cover-up job, it was a terrible one—I’m pretty sure L is going to realize. If not a cover-up job, why now as opposed to two days before they come back?]

8. Then this morning…I come back from my morning jog. Frankly, it was a nice morning—hot as all get out, but peaceful. I was on-time to get to the hospital early while still having plenty of time to eat breakfast and enjoy some quite time. I stick the key in the lock and turn it several times. It doesn’t pull the dead bolt back. After a frustrating minute of trying to get the lock to work, I decide to pull the key out and go to the back door. I turned the key back to the neutral position and tried to pull it out. It snapped in the lock. Seriously, you’ve got to be kidding me!? Now I’m locked out, without a cell phone, sweating like a pig in labor, and with only my feet to carry me the two miles to the nearest place I can get a key. Fortunately, Elizabeth had forgotten to lock the back door, so I got in and was able to get my phone and moto key. And again, this job goes to D!

9. Then this afternoon, after telling everyone about having killed off the bunny and breaking my key in the lock, I pop a tire on my moto. The only thing I can say about this is, at least it is cheap to repair. It cost me the equivalent of $0.40 to fix it.

10. I’m afraid I might sneeze too loudly tomorrow and shatter all the windows...