That's not my work

I'm so tired of the phrase, "it's not my work".
A/c installers wont do anything that might resemble electric work.
Plumbers won't do anything that might resemble carpenter work.
Carpenters won't do anything that might resemble glass work.
Painters won't do anything that might resemble carpenter work.
Yet I have to dabble in it all as I go behind each different worker to make sure their job is done correctly and thoroughly.
What am I paying them for?

Is it necessary?

What's that heap of straw on my balcony, you wonder?
Well, that's what I wanted to know when it arrived by bicycle and a man stood yelling at my door that he had my delivery.
What delivery?
Then I remembered that hours earlier, the plumber had visited.

You see, I'd spent a few hours cleaning the bathroom, two of them just on the toilet. And after the water explosion of a few days before (all faucets and connections dripping and spraying out water), there seemed to be just one smallish leak on the toilet left. So I called the plumber to fix that and do a couple other things around the house.
When he came, he looked at the leak, gave the toilet a little shake, and said, "This is bad." Then he flushed the toilet and water gushed out the back onto the floor. "This is really bad," he said, "You need a new one."
Remembering my long hours of cleaning, I asked, "Is it necessary? Really?"
He flushed the toilet and again we watched the fountain from the back.
"Okay, bring over a new one."

So that's what the delivery man brought over. The new toilet bowl, wrapped in straw.
As for that old one: what a well spent two hours of cleaning only to have it go out with the trash.

Water

It has come.
What a relief.
It took days to sort everything out. But now the pump is located and hooked up. The documents are in order with the water department. And, very importantly, an automatic switch has been has been installed on the pump to turn on when the direct line of water is running. This way the tank will fill up and I don't need to get up at 4am every day to make sure it does.

It was difficult to know I was frustrated with lack of water when every day this water truck comes two or three times to fill the community tank for the poorer people who have no running water in their homes. I should be more grateful.
And I am now. Very. Water is a beautiful thing. Coming from the taps: that's really magical.

This much water

Three buckets of water. That's how much came through the pipes while the direct line from the city was running.
I'm getting closer? Is that improvement?

Almost

There is no water yet, but maybe by the end of my birthday in a US time zone?

I guess there was an outstanding bill with the government water agency because they assumed someone was living in the apartment, using water and not paying the bill. The landlord went to their office and straightened that out. A pump was connected to the pipes and hopefully tomorrow morning when the pump can be turned on, water will start filling the pipes.
Hoping hoping.
That was amazing fast, really. Quite possibly miraculous.

On other fronts, we tried to get a few other things done for the apartment. Almost bought a slab of marble for the counter top. Almost bought some needed plywood. Almost got the junk and old furniture moved out of the flat. Traffic jams were the problem. At least today the markets we needed were open.

Along the way I saw something interesting. Some men were putting up signboards. Maybe the picture can help explain why cranes are falling on cars. There was an article about it just yesterday. It's not a crane they're using to put up the signboards, but it does show the lack of safety precautions.

Pipe technique

This is how you fix a leaky pipe.

Until you get a chance to fix it as well as this.

And that might work for a few days.

And this is where you put the pipes you haven't needed for the last 15 years.

Just make sure you don't block the road or the cows' grazing.