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Daily Life, India

The luxury of electricity

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Since returning to Delhi last weekend, I’ve been itching to sit down and write on my blog. Unfortunately, January is the chilliest time of year, and we don’t have indoor heat. We work all day at a toasty-warm school and then return home to frigid temperatures, where the concrete walls and floors trap the cold. Every evening after school, we bundled up in layers, ate dinner on our guest bed with a space heater positioned at our feet, and watched sitcoms on hulu till bedtime. I could barely hold a fork, much less type with my popsicle fingers. The sun finally peeked out yesterday, warming up the air. I looked forward to spending the weekend culling photos and documenting our Christmas. I got up early and was just ready to sit down at my computer when – pop! – the power went off. Good thing I had already made coffee! Back-up batteries protect our electronics, but we have to shut everything down when we lose power. The school sent an electrician, who “fixed” the problem, just in time for me to leave for a baby shower (without bathing – no working water heaters). As soon as I got home, I flipped on my computer, started to write a post, and – pop! – the power went off AGAIN. This time, I stomped around the house, whined a lot, ate half a bag of Chips Ahoy cookies, and barked sarcastic comments at Tony.

I went out to the stairwell to look at the breaker box. This is what I saw.
Breaker Box

About 5 minutes later, beep! – the power was back on. No telling how long we’ll have this luxury, so I’d better hustle.

Daily Life, India

Sweaty return to India

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Our first full day back in New Delhi was a sweaty one.The mercury only reached 82 degrees F (around 27 C), but the monsoon air hung heavy even during pauses in the rain.

When we lost power last year (an almost-daily occurrence), we would check the breaker box. If that didn’t do the trick, we’d wait an hour or so to see whether it fixed itself, which it sometimes did. If it didn’t, we panicked. Among the countless lessons embedded in our India learning curve is the fact that our school provides workers who will drop everything, come to our house and solve electrical problems. So rather than panicking when the lights flickered and died and the A/C fizzled around noon today, I picked up the phone to dial the Facilities Management Office. It didn’t take long for the electrician to arrive, adjust our back-up batteries to get a few lights, fans and the fridge back to work. With sweat dripping into his ears, he smiled and said, “No A/C.” Then he pointed to all the big appliances and said, “No this. No this.” And so on. I asked if the problem was unique to our house. He made a big sweeping gesture and said, “Many people.”

He wasn’t kidding.

Screen Shot 2012-07-31 at 7.10.16 PM

According to the Huffington Post article, half the country lost power today when two electricity grids collapsed. SIX HUNDRED MILLION people. Imagine if every single person in the United States lost power; now double that number! It’s more than the entire population of the European Union. Unbelievable.

We’re among the lucky ones. The Huff Post noted that one-third of India’s population live off the grid with no access to electricity in the best of times. Even during the power outage, the back-up batteries kept the ceiling fans circulating air, and our refrigerated food was safe. Plus, our power returned in full by 6 p.m. (No guaranties that it will last all night, but we’ll take what we can get.)

As if a massive power outage weren’t bad enough, I was even more horrified at the sight of TWO monkeys outside my house. Two big, nasty, aggressive monkeys. And where there are two, there are surely more (or they’ll make more). They climbed a fence across the street and ripped flowers off the trees for a snack. One reason I love my Vasant Vihar neighborhood is the dearth of monkeys. We have lots of roaming cows, but up till now, no monkeys. Massive crows squawked at the nasty creatures, and I saw some street kids chucking rocks. I can only hope the monkeys feel unwelcome and move on.