I mentioned in an earlier post that our grid power went out on Sunday around 8:30a and didn’t turn back on until around 6:30p. When our power goes out (which it does almost daily), within seconds we can hear the large diesel generator rev up that serves our apartment complex. It sounds like a large truck coming down our street. Sunday was no different. The generator revved up and power was back on immediately. A barely noticeable interruption.
However, this Sunday was different because the generator stayed on for so long. Usually the generator is needed to fill a few minute gap in power. On Sunday we started to speak louder over the generator (It is located right outside our kitchen window). At one point during the day, DW asked, “How long will the diesel last?” “Not forever,” I assured him. By 5pm, the generator sputtered leaving silence. We were out of power.
Being out of electricity in your home is something most of us have experienced. It comes as a minor inconvenience so long as we have an alternative way to cook and a few handy flashlights and candles. But since I didn’t know how long we would be without power, I started to worry about the food in our refrigerator and freezer. I recognized that we wouldn’t have hot water for showers. I wondered how long our cell phone batteries would last without being charged. I sent DW out to get matches.
We are living in posh Nairobi where every building seems to have either a generator or an inverter (a battery system) to support our lifestyles during these power outages. I didn’t even want to live somewhere without this cushion. But most of the residents of Nairobi do not have this luxury, meaning that when the power goes out, it’s out. In many ways, we are living insulated from our infrastructure.
This notion is really an insulation from society itself. We are aptly implored by the Rabbis, “Do not separate yourself from the community” (Pirkei Avot 2:5. thanks wikipedia). I believe that their statement had something to do with taking care of the public services.
This discussion makes me think about the provocative article recently published by Slate titled, “If You Send Your Kid to Private School, You’re A Bad Person.” (Not very subtle title.) The author’s main argument is that if you take your children out of the public school system, you will have no incentive to improve the system. You have no skin in the game. While I don’t agree with the article (after all, I am a product of a parochial school system that gave me a very important identification with my religion), I can see the author’s overall point about insulating oneself from the public works that support a society. If the failures of the system don’t hurt you personally, then why work to improve them. If you don’t suffer from a weak electricity grid because you can rely on backup power, then you have no need to lobby for an upgrade. As a legislator, if you don’t experience the lapses in power that plague your city, how can you truly understand the plight of the vast majority of people who do? ((As an aside: this argument taken to its logical extreme also doesn’t make sense. Do all legislators need to personally experience all conditions in order to represent the needs of people who do? No, of course not. You don’t need to have cancer to advocate for cancer research. Empathy works too.)))
As I mentioned, our power came back on just before dusk, around 6:30p. The timing of the outage sure seems suspect to me. If I was going to implement a planned outage, I would probably choose daytime hours on a Sunday. Was this something intended or something accidental? We’ll never know.
No comments:
Post a Comment