In hot water...not!

How many Indians does it take to change a hot water cylinder? It's not a joke, I'm just asking. Because it's taken days already...

A little bit of backstory first: The hot water cylinder in our bathroom stopped working while we were in Australia, and Rod got it repaired in time for our return. For Rod is a good husband, and knows how important a bath is to me all of the time, and even more so when I've just got off a plane. Fast forward six weeks, and the hot water cylinder stops producing hot water again. Now as far as I'm concerned, this makes it not a very good hot water cylinder. So we went to the same repair shop in the local market and asked for a repairman to come and fix it again. It was late in the afternoon and the owner was not in, so the man behind the counter said he would come tomorrow morning.

The following afternoon, the shop owner and his repair guy came to our house. Unfortunately they had chosen to come while there was a colony wide power cut, so they could not test the electrics on our hot water cylinder. Why did they come when they knew the power was out? They want us to call them when the power is back on. When power was restored we called the number they had given us. The man said he would come in half an hour. At six o'clock, three and a half hours after the half hour, I get Raju to call to find out when the repair guy will arrive. I don't want anyone saying I don't understand... Raju calls, and tells me it is Tuesday and they are not working today. Now I knew it was Tuesday, and I know many shops shut here on a Tuesday, but it was Tuesday four hours earlier when they stood in my house in the dark because the power was out. But it's not Raju's fault, so I just have to accept that they will do as they say, which is come to my house to fix my hot water cylinder the following day at 10.30-11.

Wednesday morning comes, and while I have hopes that the hot water will work today, I have no expectation that someone will be in my house at 10.30 fixing it. But I need to go out around lunchtime, so I'm going to need the repair guy to have an un-Indian approach to time-keeping. At 10.45 I explain this to Raju, who goes around the corner to the shop to make sure they understand I need them working in my house in the morning. The shop isn’t open yet. So Raju calls the mobile number he has been given, and is told we are the repair guy’s first job of the day.

Repair guy and his toolbag carrying sidekick arrive at D59 at 11.45, and repair guy sets about checking the cylinder. He decides to disconnect the water supply to the cylinder. At least I think that’s what he does, for copious quantities of water pour out the side of the cylinder and all over my bathroom. Sidekick stands in the bathroom holding a screwdriver. Raju stands in my bathroom holding a bucket. Repair guy takes out the scorch marked heating element, and two rods, one of which has a melted hole in the side I’m sure the manufacturers hadn’t intended.

I may make this sound like a quick job, but in fact this takes 45 minutes. During the 45 minutes, water continues to drip out the side of the cylinder. Maybe repair guy hasn’t been as diligent in turning off the water to the cylinder as he should have been. But he leaves with the three broken pieces and a 1000 rupee advance, saying he will be back to fit new parts later that afternoon. With more forethought than the repair guy, I balance the bucket on the loo seat to attempt to catch some of the drips. Why bother at this stage you may think, considering how much water has already gone on the floor? But it feels like the right thing to do, and when I returned home after my errands I found the 22 litre bucket close to overflowing.

Repair guy returns at 4.30. He empties the now again half full bucket and attempts to fit new replacement parts. He’s finding this a little tricky, because there’s a stream of water coming from the hole he’s trying to plug with one of the rods. He can use a cloth to plug up the hole. That stops the water, but he can’t get the rod in with the cloth in the way. He can take the cloth away, but then the water stream comes back. Hmmm.

Eventually he manages to get the hole plugged with the rod and he can close up the side of the hot water cylinder. He tells me it works, and asks that I test it that evening, and he will be back tomorrow to check all is well. I tell him I will check it that evening, because I’ve been looking forward to having a bath where I haven’t had to carry the hot water in from the kitchen in my 22 litre bucket. Unfortunately, that evening I was not able to have a bath, as there was no water coming out of my bathroom taps at 8pm as the roof tanks had run dry. This is not uncommon, and it often does not last for long. It might not even have been connected to the water feature that was my bathroom earlier that day. But I checked again at 9pm, and then at 10 and 11 and midnight. When the water came back I do not know. But I’d lost the urge to bathe by then!

Television 101

I don't think Keir has quite grasped how television works. This surprised Rod and I, considering how many years we have worked in the industry. And what led us to this conclusion...let's start at the very beginning, it's a very fine place to start...

Back in 2007, one of Keir's absolute favourite TV programmes was "Any Dream Will Do", the search for a new West End star to play the lead role in Joseph and the Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat. It was must see television in the Fairweather household, so much so that I made him his own dreamcoat for his birthday. That dreamcoat came with us to India, and it's still one of his favourite things. (Will I continue with the musical references? Maybe this time...)

When we returned from Australia we discovered one of our satellite channels, BBC Entertainment, was showing re-runs of the show. Keir was very excited. But after a couple of weeks, he said something that didn't quite jell with us. He was surprised when Craig was voted off the show, and said he hoped Keith would win. Now, I had hoped Keith would win, back in 2007. But he didn't win then, so I wasn't expecting him to do so in the repeat. Not even maybe this time...

So we gently tested our theory that Keir thought it was a whole new programme, but with all the same people, singing all the same songs. When asked who he thought Andrew Lloyd Webber would send home each week, he would look thoughtful, and declare Lee. For those who didn't see the programme like we have, twice, on two different continents, Lee was the eventual winner. Any dream will do, but sadly Keir's dream of a different outcome was just not going to happen!

The burning question...

After a long and detailed investigation (we opened the wall switch) Rod used his extensive knowledge and experience to identify what he believed may have been causing the sub-optimal performance of the fan in Thalia’s room …

Style Icon

My boy's a style icon! Imagine my surprise last Friday, at a 9 year old birthday party (that is, a party for a 9 year old, not a party which didn't know when to end) when the Mum of one of Keir's classmates came up and told me Suraj wants a ponytail because Keir's got a ponytail.

He's such a trendsetter! I'm sure Suraj would look good with a ponytail. We won't be in India by the time he has it, as Suraj currently has a number 3 cut!

Vegetarian shop discovered in Hauz Khas

I know where the vegetarian shop is! The paneer selling vegetarian shop. What Bapi meant was one of the vegetable stalls down the high street. Now why didn't I think of this? Possibly because the vegetable stall consists of a plank of wood on a couple of trestle legs, and no refrigeration? Bapi took me down the street and I admit I wasn't expecting to stop at a veggie stall. But under the table, in an esky (coolbox) was paneer and a big block of ice. Considering how often the electricity goes off, and how shopkeepers don't like paying for electricity to keep refrigeration units cold (it must be true - I read it in the papers!), a big block of ice is probably just as reliable, maybe more so!

Cooking with gas

One of the delights of India is the relative cheapness of household help. This is a delight, because I love household help, but I'm cheap! The daily maid is no luxury - India is so dusty, and the doors and windows so ill-fitting, floors have to be swept and washed daily. And dishwashers do exist, that's the maid again! We've had a part-time maid since we arrived last year, and send our ironing out to the press-wallah down the street (for the princely sum of 3 rupees an item, less than 5 pence!) but have not succumbed to any more help. But now we've splashed out and hired a cook! Bapi comes to us each Tuesday, and spends 90 minutes or so making 20 rotis (chapatis), a paneer (cheese) dish and a vegetable dish. This gives us two family meals each week, for 800 rupees (£10) a month! All I have to do is provide the ingredients - Bapi turns them into dinner. Bloody marvellous as far as I'm concerned!

So Bapi gave me a shopping list, and last Monday I went off to make sure I had all the right ingredients. He said to buy 2kg of Atta (wheat flour) at Big Apple, one of the local shops. I went to Big Apple, and right inside the door they had 2kg boxes of Atta. I bought one of those. And I went to Mother Dairy, the milk stall, and bought the paneer. And I bought a large selection of whole spices I've probably never cooked with before. Maybe I have, but Masterfoods wrote in English on the outside of those bottles. These spices weren't in bottles, nor were the labels in English, so I called on another lady customer to help me identify them. Big cardamon, green cardamon, black cardamon...I'm not even sure if we like cardamon! But I was pleased with my purchases. Shopping for unfamiliar ingredients, when you only know their names in a language not used on the labelling, isn't the easiest job!

Unfortunately Bapi was less pleased with my purchases than I was. He couldn't understand why I had bought that box of Atta. As far as I could see, it was the product he'd asked for, the size he'd asked for, in the shop he sent me to. But it was the wrong kind of Atta. And I'd bought the wrong kind of paneer. It was starting to feel like I was back in Britain, on the platform at Motspur Park, listening to British Rail explaining that the late arrival of my train was because the autumn leaves on the line were the wrong kind of leaves, or the snow in winter was the wrong kind of snow... Bapi was confused as to why I had gone to Mother Dairy (the milk shop) to buy the paneer (a dairy product). The best paneer, he told me, is found in the Sweet shop or at the vegetarian shop. I've told him he's going to need to take me shopping this week. I'd never ever have thought to look in the sweet shop for cheese, and I don't even know which shop in the market is the vegetarian shop. No shop in the market has that written on their shopfront, not even spelled incorrectly!

Straight, sort of...

Thought you'd enjoy seeing one of my Nehru Place purchases. I asked for half a metre of this checked fabric. The young man behind the counter snipped and tore the fabric to make a straight edge he could measure from. He then cut this piece for me.

It's 66cm at the short end, 85cm at the other. I'm so glad he tore to get a straight edge to start with! To think we used bitch about the fabric not being cut straight in quilt shops in the UK!