Prejudice is not a good friend

A Belgian friend who lived in Congo for a long time told me once that not one of her housekeepers in Congo could work with an iron unless it was broken. I thought it was very funny and 1 month ago when I bought a new (quite expensive) iron in Tirana I was still thinking about her remark and wondering if I wouldn’t better buy a cheaper one.  Today I have the answer for that.  Yes, I should have!

To describe my frustration this morning I will have to start from 3 days ago…

After finally cleaning out some cupboards (what should have been the predecessor’s responsibility, by the way, grrrrrrrr) and by blocking them against the wall to make sure that they do not totally fall apart, I started to empty the suitcases.  I prepared a whole pile of clothing to be ironed and on Wednesday I asked our housekeeper to iron before arranging them in the cupboards. When we were back in the evening, only 3 shirts were ironed (out of the 50is pieces) but I know that he had other tasks as well, so I said to myself that I had to be more patient.

Thursday morning I mentioned to Badia (the housekeeper) again about the ironing, he said “oui Madame, will do it today” but again when in the evening late I entered the room there were maybe 5 more shirts ironed and the whole pile was still lying on the floor.

Friday morning, before leaving, I told Badia again about the ironing and even told him that it must be finished today. In the evening, when we arrived home, there were so many things to arrange and organize that I forgot to check the ironing. I let Badia go home, told him not to come Saturday and Sunday and went on with organizing.

Saturday I realized that the ironing didn’t progress at all and I became aware of the fact that I will have to be firmer with Badian in the future.

This morning (Sunday) I gathered all the washed clothes, which were hanging drying and was going to iron them. In some parts of Africa or you use a tumble dryer for drying washed clothes or after drying them on a drying rack you will have to iron them one by one because of the risk of getting infected with the “bilharzias” parasite. There is a specific fly which lays eggs on drying clothes and those eggs become parasites that can infiltrate the body trough the skin. As I do not want to find out firsthand about the outcome of this 'meeting'(until my tumble dryer arrive in 2 months with the rest of our removal), I will have to iron each and every piece. 

I plugged in the iron but it was not working. I try everything to make it work but it wouldn’t budge. I got very angry at first but than I remembered my friend’s remark and I could only giggle after that.

About 2 hours later while I was writing these lines the electricity went off. My first reaction was “What else can happen today?!” but than a fast growing suspicion nestled in my had. Was there electricity when I tried the iron this morning? To test it again, first we had to find out how to turn on the generator. With the help of the guard (one is always sitting in our garage, when he is not making rounds to check the garden and the house) finally turned the generator on…. bur nothing was happening.  I was getting more and more annoyed but after making just one phone call and realizing that the maintenance was on its way I cooled down a bit. Finally after only 30 minutes the generator was running again, so I fetched the iron one more time and to my husband’s hilarity… it worked! Prejudice is not a good friend after all!

…..

 Something else did stop working today and there was no way to make it work again. The gas stove just stopped in the middle of cooking my first dinner …  One more day without a hot meal…

In the evening, after al those emotions and having worked the whole day, I have decided to take a nice bath and read a book on my Kindle. And even if I told my husband that he is not permitted to enter the room with bad news anymore today, I felt good and got the feeling that small things like a hot bath can make a world of difference between feeling grumpy or feeling content even without electricity or without gas or without … a hot meal.