I’m supposed to be writing a paper for a seminary class
(which is why I haven’t been blogging much these days), but something great
happened today that I just have to share.
In the beginning, God said, “Let there be light,” and there
was light!
Man, he makes it sound so simple.
The truth is, we have not had any lights in our bathroom in
the last six months.
You might be wondering, “What’s the big deal with that?”
Well, let me explain it to you.
I like to shower at night.
But see, our bathroom is right underneath our water tank
which sits directly above our house on our roof. The heat and sun of the day
boils the water in that tank, meaning if you take a shower during daylight
hours, it comes out almost scalding. (Ok, I might be exaggerating a smidge,
but it IS really hot.) If you want to have any chance of a shower at a decent
temperature, you gotta do it at night.
But we’ve had no lights in our bathroom. So the choice was
either sweat while you shower during the day and come out smelling just as
nasty as before your shower, or bathe in complete darkness at night. (Not so
good when shaving your legs either I might add.)
Oh, CJ in his brilliance tried to rig up some solar powered
lights and even some re-chargeable battery operated lights. The problem with
those is that they were inside the bathroom, meaning you have to step into the
bathroom to turn the lights on. But here in Myanmar, we have all our light
switches on the outside of the rooms, and it’s for one simple reason:
You never NEVER want to step into a dark room without first
giving all the critters a chance to scurry away before you enter. See? So you
turn on the lights from the outside before you enter a room, giving any
creepy-crawly things about seven seconds to go hide behind a cabinet or in a
dark corner where they can’t be seen before the human comes into the room. (If
not, said-human would have to attempt to kill the creepy crawly thing or go
screaming crazily throughout the house until another family member of said-human
is willing to come kill the varmint.)
Our family has spent some time lately trying to figure out
ways to cut our stress and make life a little more comfortable. We often go
about encountering one challenging issue or another simply because we live in a
third-world country with little resources or modern conveniences. We just say to ourselves, “Oh, this is the
way it has to be,” and we try to deal with it. But in a recent family
discussion, we wondered if maybe sometimes we suffer unnecessarily because our
country is changing and now there are opportunities for things we didn’t have
in the past.
Even though we don’t always have electricity, when we do
have it, we could surely have it in the bathroom, right?!?
So CJ called an expert electrician to see what he could do.
The problem is, our flat roof retains water during the
monsoon season and all the electrical lines up there are exposed, causing
wiring issues for everything on our second floor.
But, the electrician came today and bada bing, bada boom
– we now have lights in our bathroom! I’m so excited!
Oh sure, it’s rigged redneck-style up there, so it’s not the
most beautiful way to hang lighting. There are ugly wires and cords poking out
here and there, and there is yellow molding on the ceiling from all the water. But the important thing is…. We have lights!
While the electrician was here, I had him fix a few other
things around the house that were bothering me too. And when all was finished
and he brought me his bill for parts and labor, do you know what the total was?
It was $10.75.
TOTAL. Including everything!
So see, there are some benefits to living in a third-world
country after all.
I can’t wait to see what more changes happen here as time
progresses.
Maybe someday we’ll even have continuous electricity! Wouldn’t
that be something?
Well, a girl can dream.
But for now, I’m going to go dream in my bathroom with the
lights on. J
