No Water or No Electricity?

You have a lot of free time in Peace Corps. The hours when you are not teaching a hand washing charla for the umpteenth time or trying to track down your mayor, you spend your time pondering life’s great questions: What is the best number of people to travel with? Why doesn’t Derek make up with Meridith already? Or my favorite...What is worse: having no water or no electricity?

Now there have been various times throughout my service that I have had to go without one or the other.

When the electricity goes out, as it goes, it’s usually at a time when I seriously need to do work on my computer. I never thought how much I would be using my computer in Peace Corps for both work and otherwise. Even though there is no internet in my community, I write emails at home and save them to a thumb drive, so when I go to the internet cabina, all I have to do is copy and paste. I’ve also been given a plethora of TV and movie shows to help pass the time during rainy season, so again, without electricity, no dice. 

So what do I do? That’s when I turn to good ol’ book reading, but by the looks of my English grammar, this hasn’t happened that often. I came into the Peace Corps thinking I would spend most of my time reading all the American classics, but instead been watching all the American TV shows.  My computer battery has been plugged into so many sketchy outlets, that the battery now only last an hour; just enough time for one episode of West Wing. 

Another consequence of no electricity is my lack of coffee in the morning, as I use an electric water heater. You might be saying, “But Annie, is that really necessary?” I’ve learned many things in Peru and one of which is that coffee makes me a happier person, and this hot water heater is my ticket to freedom. But of course, even that is not dependable, as I’ve gone through two already and as I am so close to going home, have been holding out by just using the heated up tea water my host mom makes me. It’s not the best, but it does the job. 

When I go to my bi-monthly trips to Chota, I usually go for the sole purpose of getting8+ hours of fast internet to catch up on my emails and work (read: facebook). So when there is no electricity, that plan goes out the ventana along with my sanity. 

The only good thing about not having electricity is that you can still do things, like cooking. People here either use gas stoves or wood, neither of which requires electricity. I once made a very delicious French onion soup one night with my head lamp. As we were trying to figure out the light situation, the onions just kept on caramelizing. MMMmm delicious. 

But is that worse than going without electricity? When we have no water in site, it’s also at a time when I’m very dirty and in need of a good bucket bath. The water seems to go more frequently than the electricity. My town has been “fixing” the tubes for a while, so there are times when we won’t have water for 3 or more days. 

There is a pozo nearby that my host mom will fetch water from, a few buckets a day. And honestly, in the campo it doesn’t seem to upset life too much, as not many people shower or need water anyway. If anything, the dishes pile up a bit more, but again, we just leave them outside, so no big whoop. Where having no water becomes a problem is in the city, especially Chota, when things start to smell inside due to the bathroom not flushing or the dishes/people being dirty.

So if I would have to rank the two necessities, I would have to say water definitely outranks electricity. With water, I can accomplish all my basic needs: coffee, bathing, and cooking whereas without electricity, I am just without my pleasures: internet and computer time. 

Now not having either one? I’d rather not think about…

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