Willie Waterbug - my Serbian shower

Well…since yesterday things are getting a lot more exciting…

Yesterday morning I went to start the bureaucratic nightmare of obtaining my residency visa. Mostly it is a lot like going to the DMV when you move to a new state in the US, only everyone is smoking, even as they are standing right in front of the no smoking sign. It doesn’t bother me, I think it’s funny actually. I mean here you are in this office where there are so many opaque and outdated rules and regulations, all of which the people working there enforce with a relish seldom seen outside of Germany [NOTE: this kind of passion for rules is very un-Serbian, and the blatant disregard for the no smoking sign underscores this].

Anyhow, as expected, I was sent away to gather more redundant papers and asked to return next week – so fine. But then the real fun began…Igor – the embassy rep who went with me to help the process along – was kind enough to take me to buy a few things! YESSSS! I finally have a hairdryer! I even bought a curling iron, 2 power strips, AND a Serbian SIM card for my mobile phone!!! Success!!

On top of that, I spoke Serbian for a significant part of the day – so I feel a tiny victory on my part. Yet, given that this is a language that few foreigners learn - without fail – everytime I speak in Serbian, the person to whom I am speaking gets this amused grin on their face. They try to hide it, but it is the kind of little smile that you might have when you are trying to take seriously a child’s litany of school day frustrations. Again, I don’t mind. At least they are not rude [ie., “Please speak English! Your French hurts my ears!”] . It’s more like they are amused…like they think it’s “cute.” I’m sure I sound like a colloquial Yoda, and I’m sure I would be amused if the situation were reversed, so I don’t mind.

I was later invited to have dinner with an American colleague who lives here with his wife and 3 boys. They moved here in September and he will be my office mate at the University. It was really fun to hang out and share experiences, etc. We ate tacos [HOORAY!] and drank rakia [local homemade liquor reminiscent of fruit infused gasoline] and the very best part was their 7 year old son who has, in just a few months, become fluent in Serbian. That is sooo cool!

I again fell asleep really early and was awake by 4am. Fine…no problem…I had a lot of work to do today for an organization I am working with next week so I had a coffee and got down to business. I worked most of the day on that stuff until about 8pm. Now this is my first full day of focused work and that is awesome. I expect that I am going to get a lot of work done here and that is really exciting. But…it is through this process that the dark side of my cute little flat is becoming apparent…

1st – I need a comfortable work table!!! I am so sore from sitting at the crap wicker outdoor patio furniture table in this apartment!!!

2nd – I need more curtains! I feel like everyone can see right into my place because the drapes are made of flimsy chiffon.

3rd – now this is the biggie…I was so excited to wash my hair today. I finally got a hairdryer and I was like 2 days overdue for a good hair washing. So after working all day I decide to reward myself with a long hot shower.

I get wet, and am just about to start scrubbing my hair when suddenly the tube that attaches the showerhead to the faucet springs this crazy leak [think “willie waterbug”] and begins shooting water all over the bathroom…pretty much everywhere but on me! Dripping from the ceiling…filling up the trash can…saturating the 24 roles of toilet paper I bought yesterday… soaking my towels…I mean ALL OVER! But what am I to do? I am soapy and ½ washed and trying to control this wild force of nature shooting out of the middle of the hose.

I turn off the shower to see if I can fix it, but I just make it worse! What started out as a ½ inch split in the hose, partially contained by the metal spiral casing becomes with my futile and clumsy “fix-it” attempts a much longer and angrier hole, which I recognized when I turned the shower back on.

Now coming with mad force from the middle of the hose there is a combination of fire-hose strength water mixed with the blood that had begun to pore from the tiny slices that the metal casing had made in my fingers, as the slit in the hose that had grown from ½ inch to about 2 inches.

Soap now in my eyes, hair ½ washed, I think to myself “well I will just finish my hair in the faucet and will buy a new showerhead and hose tomorrow.” When I remember that I have no idea how to explain to the salesperson at the store (and no idea how to find the store) what I need.

They don’t teach you this kind of vocab in language school, nor on the audio lessons I bought on audible as a refresher before I left. You learn things like “The woman is wearing a blue dress” and “I would like to buy some bread please” and “Can you tell me where the food market is?” and even “I would like to take a shower.” But somehow phrases like “Do you know where there is a store for shower parts?” or “My shower head exploded like Willie Waterbug and I need a new one, and by the way I have no tools or practical skills to install it” are not included in the language lessons!

[And I must point out as well that there is no such thing as Home Depot here. Instead there are small shops everywhere that seem to sell randomly paired things (like electric potato mashers and curling irons in one shop, but not hairdryers for example, and everyone else seems to know that you need to go to the hairdryer and vacuum store for a hairdryer). And all of these little stores have specific names – again that I did not learn in language school!]

Still, I want to stress that I am not mad or frustrated even. Instead I am humbled by all that I do not know! And I am amused at the fact that something that would be so simple to take care of at home seems as daunting and challenging as a calculus exam for me at the moment. Luckily, tomorrow I am meeting a friend of a friend who I hope will be able to take me to the shower store to get the part I need. And maybe I will feel another victory as I learn how to install it! And maybe…just maybe…I will even find a writing table while on my outing tomorrow…oh…dare to dream! (It would be fantastic [and not the least bit surprising] if there is a shower head and writing table store!)

OK…well I am tired and hungry and am going to sign-off now. Next week will be filled with all new adventures and I look forward to reporting them. It’s funny in a way, to keep a record of these minute daily trials at the front end of my trip that will in a few weeks be barely a phantom memory. I used to keep a travel journal and was always amazed when I returned home and read it over again at how many things happen on a day-to-day basis that you forget. In a week or two, as I am fully acculturated I will not even remember these feelings or experiences.

So I guess I will finish by saying HOORAY for blog! It is my travel diary so that I can look back at this in July and laugh at how totally clueless I am right now!
Thanks for reading and I will write more next week!