stove quest

Oh Shit! Let me tell you about my day yesterday. What a long day! And it all started with a stove.

So, my stove broke the night before yesterday, and they don't sell stoves in my town. I had to go to the provincial capital, which is Beira, in order to buy a new one, 1st picture above. Yes, I could have used the coal stove, 2nd picture above, which I did that night, but that thing is rediculously inefficient and slow that I decided to get a new stove.

So, yesterday morning, I woke up at 6 to take the 3 hr boat ride to Beira, didn't actually leave dock until 8 but was actually scheduled for 7, walked to the store from the dock, bought the stove, and walked back to the chapa station right away to take the chapa back to Buzi. That was about 1230, but the one going directly to Buzi had already left, and since the next one going directly to Buzi didn't come until the next day, my only alternative was to take a chapa to another town on the way, Tica, and take a chapa to Buzi from Tica.

Well, since i've already done this twice, having missed the direct chapa to Buzi twice and having to detour to Tica, I already knew that I was going to be spending some 2 or 3 hours in Tica waiting for that chapa to fill up. That's why I hate going to Beira. It's such a waste of my fucking time! Anyway, since I knew on one in Beira, I waited at the chapa station from 1230 to 3 for the chapa to Tica to fill up, and then got to Tica around 4.

There, I'd figured I only had to wait another hour or two since the Tica chapa to Buzi usually left around 5 or 6. Boy was I wrong. At around 530, i heard the chapa driver say that since there were so few passengers going to Buzi, we would all have to pay more to make up for his lost or he wouldn't take us. Holy crap! I started freaking out because it was already so late in the afternoon on a sunday. No one else was going to come. Everyone else looked like they weren't wanting to pay the extra cost, and there were no cars driving by that road in order for me to even hitchike. I didn't know anyone with a car nearby that could come pick me up. The others were thinking about going back to Beira, but they knew ppl and I did not know anyone there I could stay with either. I also wouldn't want to pay to go back to where I just came from and waste all that money, so if he refused to take us, I would probably sleep in Tica, the town with population 75!

I started looking around and Tica had no hotel or anything like that at all. It was maybe a collection of 20 houses, and the only thing my panic state of mind could think of was to sleep on someone's front porch until the next day when I could catch the chapa back to Buzi. WTF! I did not know what to do. See, this is the problem with being by yourself in a country you are not used to.

We waited around some more, but no one else came, and it was 630, getting dark. Other ppl were begging the driver to take us, but the Mf kept refusing saying he wouldn't make any money taking us. In the end, a couple of us ended up paying double the normal price to cover others who didn't have enough and we were on our way when it was dark. i was just so happy because i didn't have to sleep on someone's porch, but the ride has got to be one of the worst ride i've had. It was 2 hours on the back of a truck bed on an unpaved road. Imagine someone bouncing you on their knees every 10 minutes, except instead of falling back down on a cushioned knee, you land on a hard truck bed. Since it was so bumpy, i was afraid my new stove would break, which would have defeated my entire trip, so I had to cradle it in my arm like a baby, cushioning it with my legs and dissipating the 'knee bounces' with my body. It's really hard to do when the driver didn't give a crap about us in the back and was speeding and braking like a madman and me trying not to slosh around all over the truck bed. I was just so happy I finally made it back around 9. Damn, if it was America and I needed to get something quick from the store, the furthest I would have to go is maybe across town and I could call on ppl if anything went wrong. It was really scary to think that I had no one to call. Sure I could call Peace Corps, but what can they do? They live in another province. The best they could have done was give me verbal advice..

Well, that was my long ass quest to get a new stove. Picture 3 is of my kitchen. 4 is my mini fridge and the big green thing in the back is what I store water in. 5 is my living room. 6 is my bathroom with the tub that i use for showering. Toilet is flushed with water in the green bucket next to it. 7 is my closet with the missing door. Next time, I'll post pictures of the town.