Fixing the Broken Things: Part II

Now that Prema has returned, and is safely in her room, I can relay the rest of the story about the broken things.

Additional broken things:
Washing Machine
Bed Board

The decline and fall of the washing machine is a long process, which is still happening. We were lucky enough to be around during an exciting part of this decline. One of our housemates, Kim, was distraught - the washing machine wouldn't drain. I scoured the internet for a repair manual or something, anything. I found something in Japanese for a close cousin model, but this model is elusive like a Dodo bird in December. Kim called a repairman the next day, and he managed to get it to drain. They tested it on some small dishcloths, it worked. Everyone was happy again.

We tried to run a load of clothes. It made it to the rinse cycle, and caved. We agreed that we'd call the dude again tomorrow, and ask him to fix it for real this time. In the mean time, we had a full load of cleaned clothes that needed to be wrung. So I set about wringing, and Em set about hanging what was wrung. What I didn't realize about wringing out a large load of laundry, is that it's actually tiring, and can flay your skin. Ok, ok, "flay" is a bit excessive, but my inferior wringing technique manged to give me minor blisters, and remove the skin by the end of the load. Aaaah.

The repairmen took the washing machine away this time, and returned it. Only for it to not work again that night. Sigh. One of the teachers at GEMS, Thavet, decided to give his washing machine repair skills a shot, and succeeded. Apparently, the culprit was a pipe which was pointing up, instead of down. I wonder now what the repairmen actually did?

The Bed Board.

This one has a back-story:
1) Battambang gets very dark at night - there are no streetlights near GEMS, so we were often submerged in darkness by about 7p.m.
2) When we arrived at GEMS, there was talk of a rat, or of rats in the kitchen (and thus the need to store everything securely before going to sleep)
3) The combination of these two preceding points left Emily somewhat fearful of the kitchen at night. I think that she knew seeing a rat in the kitchen would ruin her time eating food in the same kitchen ,and was more afraid of seeing a rat, than actually knowing that one exists in the house. This resulted in her often asking me to come turn the light on in the kitchen...to make sure it was safe (or give everything a chance to hide).

One night, a week or two ago, I fell asleep while Emily was preparing her lesson for the next day. Before going to sleep, she decided she wanted a glass of water. Considerate wife that she is, she decided not to wake me up just to turn on a light. As she approached the kitchen in the dark (you have to walk into the kitchen, and around a corner in order to flick the light switch), she thought to herself "there's nothing here, nothing's ever here, I don't have to be afraid". Almost in response to her brave thoughts, claws scrabbled on the floor, and small animal ran past her and down the stairs (turns out it was a cat). She let out an ear-piercing scream. Down the hallway, previously asleep in the bed, I lept completely upright. landing just in front of the foot of the bed, with my face in the mosquito netting. I ran to the kitchen, and, after discovering what had happened, laughed with Em for a solid 10 minutes.

Dudes setting up chop

Then we went back to bed, and I noticed that something wasn't right when I res-set the mosquito netting. The bed-board is in two pieces, and the piece on my side of the bed was completely broken near the foot of the bed. Luckily, this doesn't actually interrupt sleep, as the rest of the board holds the mattress up fine - and all is well as long as you don't sit on that exact spot. Still, we wanted to return Prema's room to her in good condition. So we decided we'd look for a replacement board.

Replacing MDF is Battambang is a challenge, and I ended up having to use wood of the same thickness instead. There is a shop close to GEMS that sells construction supplies, but she didn't have a saw to cut the wood to the size that I needed (and I didn't have a saw either). So I headed off (just yesterday) to road 5, where I was told more construction supply shops abound. I cycled around, and asked at once place, fumbling my way through khmer, and using a lot of gesturing to explain what I needed. After a few minutes, when the seller finally understood what I needed, she told me that she didnt' have any, and that I should go farther down the road. I did, and found a place. I talked to about three people before finding someone that seemed like they were understanding what I wanted. They went back and forth from having the wood to not having it, from being able to cut it, to not, etc. Finally, I realized that the hang-up was whether I would pay for the whole sheet, or just my small cut. I assured them I'd buy the whole thing (at a discount because the sheet was damaged). I marked the lengths that I wanted, and they got a guy who could use a skill-saw like a champ to cut the piece out for me.

I left the rest of the wood with them, and grabbed my two-meter piece, mounted my bicycle, and rode off like a knight in a jousting competition. Managing neither to bring injury to myself or to others, I arrived at GEMS (I shared many smiles with people on the way, marveling at the ridiculous prospect of a white guy attempting such a feat of balance). After all of that, the piece was a bit long. So I went back to the nearby shop, bought a hand-saw, marked the length, and cut it up. Finally, the bed-board was replaced!