Saturday, July 9, 2011

So Fresa....

Fresa means strawberry but it also means something along the lines of bouzhy (No, I don't know how to spell booshie/bourgey...the shortened form of bourgeoisie or bourgeois). So last week I was sick. Wikipedia say travelers diarrhea takes about 2 weeks before it sets in. Well at just about the two week mark it hit me all at once. Me running to the bathroom every 20-30 minutes, nothing by water comes out. Headaches, general weakness. M. went to buy me some suero, which is a generic word for what is essentially pedialyte.

Now, the position of our room in the house means it gets the most direct sun and is therefore 110 degrees during the day. It was at that moment when I couldn't lift my head off the pillow that was soaked in my sweat that we decided we would buy an air conditioner. At home this means you buy the unit, stick it in your window, seal it up and you're done. But no, here no.

First, we bought the unit. It is nearly identical to the one we had in our room at home and was priced similarly, so far so good. Well then we had to hire someone to cut a hole in the concrete wall. And an electrician to install an outlet and what I think is a breaker box above it. I don't even think it was necessary since the a/c unit is a 110 plug but whatever, I just go along with it. And then we have to install a ceiling so all our precious cool air doesn't escape through the gap between the walls and the roof. Drop ceilings are the thing here so that's what we're getting. And we need caulk to fill in the gaps and cracks like you can see around the window in the photo below.




I'm hoping (FINGERS CROSSED), that all this sealing up will mean less bugs and mosquitoes in our room. I'm tired of marinating myself in deet everyday, it can't be healthy.

So, all of this was last week. I'm not sure what happened, but at some point someone was working on the roof to fix a very small leak and now it rains in our room. And the room next to us. Right at the peak, in a straight line across the room, the water just falls in there. So hopefully they're fixing that today and then we'll get our ceiling installed so we can test out our a/c. We are soooooo fresa.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I am not trying to scare you, but be careful with the drop ceiling, make sure they seal all the holes with cement. Other wise the space in between your ceiling and the roof makes a great home for rats.

Anonymous said...
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julie said...

I've already heard them!! Twice now, I hear them when they drop down and it slightly rattles the metal strips between ceiling tiles. Worse is, our room and his sister's room kinda make up one small rectangle house. The wall between the two rooms doesn't go all the way to the roof and the sisters said they saw a rat up there, cause it's open on her side. I feel awful and I'm not sure what to do because, well it's too complicated to go into in the comments really. I wish someone had told me before we installed the ceiling.

Anonymous said...

Put some poison and or traps Before they breed. Your are lucky to have it open on one side with easy access. You will probably have to put poison about once a month, but it is cheap. About $1 a bag.

BTW rubi1904@aol.com if you ever want to "talk" privately