Spent last night alone in our new über-Flat. My better-half is in Mumbai and she stuck me with the luggage and dog to take to our new home. No hard feelings though, the dog and I survived the ordeal in the treacherous heat! Yeah, Beckett, the killer pug, the three of us, have been living out of luggage since March 1 and dealing with treacherous heat. We have also been dependent on krappy utensils, cheap cookware, hotel food and too much quick & easy cooking and, and, and. Plus, I hate eating out all the time. The problem with eating out is that two-thirds of restaurants I visit these days only prove that I’m a better cook. Seriously. You don’t reach this worst-level of life experience and waistline without knowing how to top most restaurants at their own game. As long as I have a flame, a good knife and a woman standing behind me wondering how I was able to become such a great kitchen lover-home-maker while she’s wearing beckoning skivvies… But I digress.
This pseudo bourgeois redneck has had enough of the transition from the western world to the almost western world. I’m bored of the waiting, the bureaucracy, the hint that eventually our container will arrive and all is well that will surely end well. That’s a kinda of call-out to my India audience that I’m ultimately impressed with the relative comfort and ease of moving–to your country. As far as our new über-Flat goes, though, dear India, you seriously have to get your shabby craftsmanship and cheap labour under some kind of control. And I’m not (worst) talking as a wannabe pseudo Marxist here.
We picked out a great flat. I think we’re gonna enjoy living here. Gonna dig getting lost in the place that’s for sure. I suppose 4000+ square feet will have that effect. But get this. Had a run-in with the reverse osmosis water filter that we demanded be installed by the landlord. Obviously one can’t drink or even work with tap water here. All one can do is clean with it, bathe in it and, if you’re lucky, splash it on you to cool down. I’m sure most people are aware that one can’t even wash veggies with tap water here. For that reason we demanded a reverse osmosis water filtration system. Gee, I kinda like worst-writing that.
The idea is, a reverse osmosis filtration water machine will clean the water enough so that we can work with it and not have to worry about a small wound getting infected or our cleaned veggies being tainted by pathogens. The only problem is, when I turned it on for the first time yesterday, the fucking thing exploded. Luckily what exploded was the water pressure inside the device. I called the property manager—who’s in charge of our flat—and this afternoon a technician from the manufacturer was here toot sweet. He fixed the device, I guess, and then left. That is, I let him in, I showed him where the device was hanging on the wall in the kitchen, and then I let him do his thing. And that’s all fine & good. It’s just that, after about forty-five minutes, without even saying goodbye or acknowledging that his work was done, I see him through my office window leaving the flat. Ok, I thought. To each his own. So I went into the kitchen and turned the repaired device on. It has to go through this process of filling an internal “clean” water tank. An external hose discards “raw” water to the sink. I’m thinking that later on when we start to get used to things here, I’ll collect the dirty water and use it for plants.
The machine takes about 30 minutes before you can draw clean water from it. So I returned to my office and got back to wasting time—or wishing I was writing one of my novels. After about 20-30 min I heard this strange noise from the kitchen. I go look and the fucking osmosis water filtering piece of shit has exploded again! I turn off the power switch and then unplug it. I drain some of the water out of the internal tank as that’s the culprit of most of the mess in the kitchen and then I call the property manager and within an hour the same technician returns. He starts working on the device again and I go about my business of wasting time writing shit that no one will ever read.
After about 30 min I hear this strange sound from the kitchen–again. This time the fucking fancy, brand new, reverse osmosis water filtration system has exploded all over the technician. Luckily it’s just water and not some otherworld sticky machine ejaculate. So the guy goes about repairing it and after about an hour he tests the machine. This time I’m within viewing distance because I wanna see that new fangled thing explode first hand. But I’m left disappointed. Then he tells me, just before he leaves, that I should watch out for the incoming water pressure.
“I should whaaaaa,” I ask.
“That’s the problem,” he says in some strange India English tongue.
Ok, I thought. Whatever. As I type this the water filtration tank is full but I’ve turned it off—just in case!—for the night. We’ll see how things go tomorrow. Next big hurdle to cross is the cheap, careless craftsmanship that has left our fucking toilets leaking.
Lions and tigers and bears… Oh my.
Rant on.
PS You know what they say about spending first night in a new home, right? They say that what you dream will come true. I’m sure the idiot that came up with that was drunk of optimism, too.
-t
worstwriter 