Thursday, December 01, 2005

My boy's class had to finish a worksheet that asked them to match phrases with Celsius temperatures- for example, 0 would be matched with water freezing, 100 with water boiling. Uniformly, they matched 55 degrees (130 degrees F) with "a cool day" and 20 degrees (68 degrees F) with "a warm bath." This just illustrates the point that Belizians like to take cold showers. My housemates and I have not yet adjusted to this way of life, so we wimpily purchased an electric water heater for our shower. Now, this is not something that is luxurious, by all means, so we still consider ourselves missionaries and not tourists :) The unit fastens on to the shower head so water runs through it, warmed as it moves by a hot coil. As I mentioned, it is electric, which is counterintuitive to all the warnings we've ever been given about not taking your hairdryer/radio/whatever into the bathtub with you. We've managed to avoid most shocks- as long as you don't touch it while the water is running, you are usually fine. Yesterday, however, our landlord came in and (for some unknown reason) replaced the plastic faucet in the shower with a metal one. Now, the electric shower has the annoying habit of suddenly turning off in the middle of a shower (resulting in a sudden stream of COLD water), which can usually be fixed by turning the faucet slightly. Last night when this happened I got a good lesson in conductivity. The metal faucet gave me a nice shock when I went to adjust it. So I remembered the lesson I taught on insulators last year, and spent the rest of the shower banging on the faucet to adjust it with a plastic shampoo bottle.
On a different note, last night I got a cooking lesson from a neighbor, and made tortillas over a fire!

2 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Hi there,
I hope you're fine after the conductivity lesson. ;) Just remember the showers in Duesseldorf - the only warm place at the campside :D that really WAS a luxury compared to the pilgrims bath-super-big-tents...
Take care!
zuzanna
zuz at op dot pl

10:27 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Hello,
You know my dad is an electrician, and that is what I am working at right now. So reading this was quite interesting! I hope the receptical you are plugging into is ground-faulted! -and if not, while I'll keep you in my prayers!! :) (jk!) But do try and be careful!
I hope you're having a great day today in Belize!
Gabriel Walz
(wyd2005)

12:18 AM  

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