Power Trip

On the first day of school one of the middle schoolers recommended that I buy a big generator, since the power goes out so frequently. Not bad advice since the power goes out a lot here. I would say on average 4-5 times a day. It makes for some really hot classrooms and frustrating times when your working on a document for the 3rd time that day only to lose it...again. (If there are any of my students from DR reading, I finally understand what it's like to live with intermittent electricity!)

Last night Rachel and I ventured out and about and managed to find the 5th Avenue of Khartoum. There were actual shops with fashionable goods, a restaurant or two, a stationery store AND a fish market! (Hey you Kansas readers, aren't you jealous??)

Yes, we are in the desert, usually not the place you want to go shopping for seafood, but we had heard good things about this place and it seemed to be a cool and clean place. We picked out a nice Red Snapper (on ice) and managed to convey that we wanted it filleted. Before we knew it, our fish was weighed, paid for and in the back being sliced apart. Ahhh....

I decided it was time to take a photo to show off what a fine establishment we had found. "Smile, Rach!" And...

ZZZZZZZZZAP!

Power's out. Did I mention it was nighttime? As in pitch dark?? As in NO lights whatsoever?? (This photo gives you the illusion of light. That's just the flash, silly.)

So, here we are stuck inside the fishmonger's wondering what to do. Suddenly, cell phones magically appeared. ( I was really worried that the man in the back was going to keep slicing our fish by the light of his Nokia. Dear god, I did not want to be responsible for a loss of limbs!)

There was quite a raucous of movement, and it became quite apparent that no one was sure when the power was going to come on again or if the generator even worked. After quite some banging and arguing, our fish slicer finally came out in his little vinyl blue apron to share his generator expertise. We waited probably 15 minutes in the dark, wondering if we should just leave our fish for later. As it turns out, he was the expert!

With a shout of glee, the lawn-mower style generator was chugging along--the air conditioning was running again, the ever-present TV with Arab soap-operas was back on and the florescent lights declared that "Two Brothers Seafood" was open for business!! Within 5 minutes we had our fish and were in a taxi headed home! Just another typical day here in Sudan!