We’re on day three of this thing squatting on my doorstep.

When you live in a place like Dakar, you have no choice but to pit different cases of Murphy’s Law against one other if you hope to get anything accomplished.

I know that I have already complained about the puzzling maintenance service in my building. I accept the 50.5% solution, and I cope with this reality by “saving up” problems for moments of unusually high stamina in terms of patience. In a culture that continually drains me of my spoiled Western tolerance levels, such bouts of strength don’t occur as often as I’d like. Put quite simply: the game ceases to be fun when it feels like you are never winning.

Call me masochistic, but since the new year has started I have been more willing to enter into this game of give and take. Maybe it’s because January marks one year since I have been in Senegal, but I feel some compulsion to take on what I view as outstanding issues that could use some resolution in my life. I’m not talking about your typical new year’s intentions that quickly fade away- I’m focusing more on fixing things in my apartment, or eschewing the “I”m new around here” perspective and instead dealing with ridiculousness by talking aloud to myself in English.

So without further ado, here’s a slice of this week’s maintenance challenge that comprised several metamorphosing variables that came straight out of Murphy’s playbook. 

Light bulbs: power outages notwithstanding, my apartment is getting progressively darker as each light burns out. The ceilings are really high, and my little step ladder can’t reach the recessed lighting. I also have no earthly desire to stack various forms of furniture on top of one another in order to change them. Nor do I feel like venturing out into town to find said  bulbs that are of unusual shape and size. Bam.

Air conditioner: the unit in my room was replaced last summer and the “new” one has progressively died over the past three months. I have had the technician over at least ten times to “fix” it, but the problem would only come back once he left and it resumed normal operation. It got really bad last week when the motor started making an evil noise the precluded me from even turning the unit on for soothing background noise.  

Last Friday, I got an email from UCAD saying that classes this week were canceled because the teacher (subject: economie agricole) wouldn’t be available. Excellent! Here’s an opportunity for me to station myself chez moi and call up Issaga in order to arrange some home improvement. 

Issaga- I don’t know what his actual job title is- but he’s the dude I call when I need stuff fixed. This means that he is also my nemesis.  He’s not a technician, but an overpaid middleman. He came over early this week to see what I was talking about when I told him that my A/C was still broken and now making a loud noise.

Issaga materializes and I show him the A/C. “Ça, c’est pas normal (That is not normal)” he says when I turn the unit on. Thanks Columbo, now why don’t you call someone who can do something about it? He says he will call a technician, and he’ll be in touch. As for my dead light bulbs, I need to call the building superintendent.

I’m going to condense the ensuing details of the week in order to spare you some boredom:

As it turns out, I am not an economist. It doesn’t matter if you teach it to me in French, or in English- my brain does not want to absorb this material. So while I am weighing my options for Saturday morning’s activities, I am reminded of a scene from The Breakfast Club:

I like light, and couldn’t care less about economie agricole, so I decided to skip class this morning and hedge my bets that at least one maintenance person (and hopefully that person will not be Issaga) will come to my house and be of use.

Guess what? At exactly 11:09 this morning my doorbell rang, and two technicians came into my house with the replacement motor in tow. At present I can hear them banging away and doing some form of modification to my A/C configuration.  I kind of feel like in this one instance I have scored a victory: on this go around I correctly selected the Murphy’s Law scenario that was less likely to happen, and thus I feel like I am finally becoming a better player.

So the next time you reach up and unscrew a light bulb, or go down to the Home Depot with a mystery part in hand that requires replacement, think of us over here and how challenging it is to accomplish even the simplest task. We’re lucky over in America, but if anything this doesn’t serve us well when we must venture ailleurs in order to carve out a living under a different set of rules.