Car today, gone tomorrow

Ha! I knew it was true! only 4 responses to my online poll. This confirms my suspicion that I truly only have 3-5 faithful readers. Thanks for hangin on! There definitely will be rewards for all of you in June '08 (if you can make it that long!--And, since no one seems to notice when I miss a post, there clearly is no need to make good on the free gin offer... I didn't post yesterday, but there was a power outage during my evening posting time, so... NO FREE GIN FOR YOU! ;-)

Oh, and the new contest (re: what is Heather's prize for winning the 'big bug' contest). Two people have guessed. One (Cherette) said a carved wooden box, and the other (my Grandma) said 'something carved out of wood from the peddler' I mentioned in an earlier post. Both of you are very close, but you have to guess the exact item, and only Heather can tell you if you're right. That's all I'll say on the subject for now. I'll let Heather deal with those guesses over the next two weeks. I still have to find something to send the prize in to get it out to her. I'll be going to a bigger post office tomorrow, so it should go out then. Good luck! ;-)

Speaking of the poll, ALL FOUR VOTERS WERE WRONG!! So, no prizes yet. Amazingly, my car did materialize yesterday. I even had pictures taken of me sitting in it, but forgot to bring them to the office with me this evening. I'll do my best to upload those soon. Of course, the delivery did not go without a hitch. First of all the delivery driver insisted on meeting me in Zomba, where I was hanging out with Carlos for lunch and a bit of "supermarket" (HA!) shopping. I was more than a bit nervous about this, because Zomba's a pretty busy place, and well, you know, the left side of road, right side of car, shifting with left hand, yadda yadda yadda. In any case, the guy decided to come anyway, even though Carlos and I had arranged a taxi to take me back to Domasi to meet the driver with my car.

Of course, not only did he meet me in Zomba, but also in one of the busiest areas-- what I call the "Banking District," as the (only) 3 banks in Zomba are located there, which makes it a center for many things, such as buying cell phone cards, people selling fruits and vegetables, and getting gas (it's also the "petrol district"). I've noticed that many cities here are organized this way. All of the banks and gas (i.e. "petrol" in these parts... bloody brits... gotta love 'em!) stations are in the same areas. This is convenient in a way, because you know where to find everything, but also inconvenient, as when you need a bank or petrol, there's only one place you can find them. If you're not in that place, no money or gas for you!

So, I was in this very busy area, waiting for my car, extremely nervous about the whole thing. Carlos, sensing my stress (well, after witnessing a minor meltdown as I cursed the driver after finishing my conversation with him), offered to go with me in the car to Domasi to make sure I got there o.k. It was a very good thing that he chose to do this, as you will see later.

After waiting for about 10 minutes or so (which felt like an hour or so), the driver came, paperwork in hand, with all receipts and an itemized invoice detailing all of the costs incurred by the dealer in handling the processing of the vehicle. This was necessary, as it turned out I still owed the dealer a fair amount of money (24,000 kwacha, to be exact--about $174). I wasn't too thrilled about the extra cost, but was very happy to see the car nonetheless.

So, I got in the driver's seat (on the RIGHT), Carlos got in the passenger seat (on the LEFT), and the car delivery guy got in the back seat. And, off we went. Amazingly, it was all fine. Did I mention that the car has a manual transmission? Luckily, I do drive a manual back home (unlike most Americans), so I'm very comfortable with the shifting/clutch, but the shifting pattern feels backwards and strange when using your left hand... In any case, I did alright. The clutch was very smooth, and the gears engaged easily, no grinding necessary. So, I backed it out of the busy bank parking lot (avoiding a few fruit vendors on the way), pulled it out into traffic taking a right turn into the left lane, and off we went! Amazing. I didn't hit anyone, and didn't kill the engine! The only thing I did do was turn on the windshield wipers instead of the right turn signal. This is the one thing that's taken me the longest to get used to. On Japanese cars (yes, from Japan... they also drive on the wrong side of the road), the directional lever is on the right side of the steering wheel, rather than the left. They actually have a separate lever for the directional and lights (on the right), while the lever on the left only controls the windshield wipers. Not only that, but when you want to turn right, you have to pull the lever down, and when you want to turn left, yhou have to push the lever up. This is extremely counter-intuitive for a bloody yank like myself. I'm still turning on the wipers every time I wanna make a flippin' turn. But, I'm learning.

So, now to the meat of the story (finally)... I drive the car the 20 or so miles back to Domasi, drop off the car delivery guy near the turnoff to the college where he'll pick up a minibus back to Lilongwe. I then drive to campus and stop at my house to show off the car to Deliwe and Harold (the gardener), who promises to "wash it every day" for me. Isn't that sweet? I'll try to discourage him, though, as I hate to waste all that water. But the thought was nice. So, after gushing and getting Carlos to take a picture of me in my new car, we decide to head back to Zomba to take Carlos back to his house. On the way, I realized the petrol tank was almost empty, so I decided to stop at the BP station (ya, they're everywhere! Bloody Brits) and get some GAS. After the tank is almost full (GAS is VERY EXPENSIVE here... about $5 a gallon by my lates estimate), I turn the key in the ignition. Nothing. I look at Carlos. He says, "try again." I turn the key again. Nothing but a grinding noise. After doing this 4 or 5 times, we realize something's wrong. So, we open the hood, and Carlos takes a look with a couple of the gas station attendants. After a little while, Carlos picks up a big tree branch and tells me he's going to hit the starter with it. By the way, did I mention Carlos is from Puerto Rico? They have some exotic practices there, apparently. He said that to test whether the starter is the problem, he had to hit it with this big tree branch. If the car starts after he does this, then it's definitely a problem with the starter. So, he hits it with the branch. But still, it doesn't start! Based on Carlos' theory, this should be a good thing. Or should it? At this point, I'm completely dumbfounded. And dumb. And Deaf. And I've had enough. Then, Carlos says, "O.K. Let's try something else. Put the car in neutral. We're going to push it. Then, when I tell you, pull up the clutch." Another Puerto Rican ritual, I thought. Apparently it's a way to jump-start the engine, and it worked. As I was rolling backwards, I suddenly realized the car was running. Wow! A miracle!

So, after this experience, it was clear that unless I wanted to roll the carl and pop the clutch to get it started on a regular basis, I was in serious need of a mechanic. As luck would have it, a mechanic was there at the petrol station. His name was Peter. He agreed to look under the hood to confirm whether it was the starter, which he did. He then told us he couldn't work on it until the morning (it was already after 5 p.m., and everything stops at that time here, especially because the sun sets by 6 p.m. So, we put our faith in Peter, pulled the car into the service area which was fenced off and appeared secure, walked up to Carlos' place for a beer, and then I called my favorite cabbie Melvin to take me home. Melvin, incidentally, was the cab driver who witnessed my mini-meltdown earlier that day, so I was a bit concerned that he might not let me back into the car. However, Melvin, like most Malawians I've met, is a gracious and kind soul, so of course gladly drove me back. Though, looking back on it, I think he charged me a bit more than usual. Hmmm....

So, of course, this morning, I was concerned. Has my kharma changed here? Will I continue to experience bad luck from now on? Will the car be fixed this morning as promised? Worse yet, will the car still be there? All of these thoughts were going through my mind as I spoke with Sydney, the director of my department at Chancellor College, telling him of the problem and how I was hoping things would work out o.k. After starting my journey back into Zomba with the dreaded walk through campus to the mini-bus stop, my luck did suddenly change for the better. As I walked, a truck came by, driven by the same guy who drove me to the post office on Tuesday. Luckily, he was taking a few staff members to Zomba, so offered me a ride. Yahoo! No minibus today! He then dropped me off at the trusty ol British Petrol station, where I found Carlos (he asked me to call him before going into Zomba so he could check that the car was o.k.). Of course, Peter the mechanic was not there, but some other guy was, explaining that it was fixed, gave Carlos the key and a small invoice for 1,900 kwacha (400 kwacha more than the original quote, but still relatively reasonable). Despite Carlos' attempts to find out what exactly was done to the car, it seemed to be in good working order, and I made it to class in plenty of time. In fact, I drove the car a few times today, and no problems. I even had to drive a bit in the dark on my way home this evening. I've now gotten used to honking at people in the road. This is weird for me, as I almost NEVER honk the horn back home. But here, it's a necessity, as the roads are very narrow, and since there are so few cars on the roads, the pedestrians, cyclists, goats, and dogs take over the pavement until the rare passing vehicle comes along. Most motorists have to honk just to remind the non-motorists that we can kill them if they don't move. As a cyclist myself, it's still taking me some getting used to, as I hate it when I get honked at by rude drivers while on my road bike.

OK, I got on another tangent there, but I'm sure my 3-5 faithful readers won't mind, as you're all used to it by now. So that's the first car saga. I'm sure there will be many more. Tomorrow, I'm off to Blantyre (about an hour away) to meet some U.S. Embassy contacts at the French Cultural Center for lunch. Oui, Oui, it should be interesting. I'm not sure if I'll be back in time to complete my blog entry, so for now I'm giving myself tomorrow (Friday) off from the blogosphere, but I should be back on Saturday! Tiwonana! (Watch for new car pix, coming soon!)