iLectronics problems

I have mentioned that AUN gave all the faculty an iPad for use at work. It's been quite handy and I confess it has addicted me. But there's this problem. It's called electricity. I've commented on it before. Often.

Traveling Advice - Electronics

We got ourselves a step-down transformer for Nigeria. It would convert their 240-V electricity to 110-V so our electronics would be in less danger of frying. True, AUN provides one, but it would be very nice to have a second.

The transformer is HEAVY. So rather than put it in our checked bags, we decided to have it in our carry-on. Part of the reason we had a 45-minute love-in with the TSA was that their scanner cannot see inside the transformer and they confiscated it. $60 down the drain.

Now, the agent insisted that we would be able to pay the $100 for an extra bag and send it through our checked luggage, but after the handling we had received I doubted he knew his own name without looking at his name tag. So I called up the TSA to ask. No, they said. If the scanner upstairs couldn't see through it, the scanner downstairs won't either. We'll confiscate it there too.

So instead we're going to make do with one for our first 3-5 months and ship ourselves a second one. But if any of our fellow travelers are thinking of carrying a transformer with them, be ye warned.
 -- Derrill

Who are these little people: "John-Thomas"

JT recently turned 2 and is figuring out how to talk. We have been very excited as he recently discovered 3-4 word sentences: "Daddy cut cheese" (literally), "We read about Jesus," "I want drink" and the like.

JT is the cutest, most adorable little person. His adoring smile greets us first thing each morning. He likes to "hug" and tonight when I hurt my wrist, he came right over, said "kiss," and fit word to deed. When he prays, he lists everyone in the house every time - and sometimes multiple times just because he enjoys saying our names. He sometimes lists our names when we're not praying, just to ask where everyone is. The flip-flop pitter patter of his feet running through the house is a delight. He's developed the most adorable little "pouty face" with a protruding bottom lip. I give his lip a beep, show him my protruding bottom lip, and sing "If you chance to meet a pout, do not let it staaaaay. Quickly turn it upside down and smile that pout away." He usually smiles broadly again right after.

Wedding #1 - Grand Junction, CO

McKenzie's pun is that she caught "the last Straw."

The timing of this year's vacation was determined by a couple family weddings. My only uncle, Sherm Straw, has but one son, and he was sealed in the Washington DC temple last month. That's the same temple where my parents were married. So we left Stephenville just as soon as I was done with my work for the semester and drove up to Grand Junction, CO to attend Brandon and McKenzie's reception.

Correction: Electronics

I needn't have worried so. When Joy went to the market, she found two 200 watt step-down transformers. Now we have a DS. Now we have a working VCR/DVD player that plays our stuff. Now we have a working baby monitor we can plug in in both rooms. Now we can charge our US phone and get our friends' phone numbers. Now we can wish we had kept the original Wii cord, because the replacement we got still doesn't work. Well, I guess we can replace it next year. But everything else is just fine. We can get all the transformers we want for 13 bucks. There was no need to have gotten even one, let alone two, $60 transformers, plus shipping.

But that's why we have this blog, to let future travelers beware.

Coming Home to Nigeria

What makes us feel like we're coming home?
When we went down for breakfast at the hotel in Abuja on our way to Yola, we found our former-neighbors there, who are some of our best friends here. Several other friends flew in with us on the same plane. A student recognized me and greeted me happily. Our compound's guards laughed and rejoiced to see us return. Friendly faces make for nice homecomings.

Prince excitedly cried, "I'm going to go see my room!" He crowed, "Look at all these great toys!" Then he grabbed up ... "Yoshi! Oh Yoshi, I missed you so much!" He spent the next minute talking to a plush ridable dragon.

Princess, who was not allowed on the floor until the cockroaches were swept up, explored the house for the first time on her own two feet and also found her room and the wonderful toys therein.

What was Joy delighted to see? "I can find my can opener! That means I'm home."

My delight, of course, was finding my work computer and being able to sit down at my own computer for the first time in three months (story in a coming post). The other electronics are still at an office on campus, so it's just a question of how long I can be kept from heading over there before I have the rest of them again.

What makes us feel like we're coming home ... to Nigeria?
Having the electricity shut off at the hotel and seeing all the faculty/staff present say, "Welcome back to Nigeria!" as they take a deep breath of air -- some of them like they're getting ready to dive in, others as if they were smelling mother's cooking.


Joy rejoiced at how clean our home was. I reminded her about the cockroaches on the floor. "Well, yes, but it's really very clean ... aside from the cockroaches." I swept up a full cup of them plus two grasshoppers.

I realized at some point that my inspection of the house when I came in was to see 1) how many lights broke while we were gone; 2) what else needs fixing; and 3) if was anything stolen. I never acted that way in Ithaca.

Coming home to Nigeria also means reshifting expectations:

Nomnomgeria - a repost

I posted this on our family blog about a year ago after my visit. So these are the thoughts of someone who hasn't lived in Nigeria for a year:

Expecting the Worst

I mentioned before (I think) that on my way to Yola last time, I received some friendly advice: Set your expectations as low as you can, then one or two notches lower than THAT, and you will on occasion be pleasantly surprised. That is supposedly the secret to happiness in Nigeria.

That may or may not work for day-to-day matters. I'm not yet qualified to comment. But it sure is terrible advice for preparing to get there.

Other friendly advice has told us not to ship ourselves any food or valuables because it might stolen by customs officials. Okay, but what's valuable? We aren't big into jewelry and flashy expensive looking things anyway. We got some new electronics, like a second step-down power transformer to reduce the chance of frying our stuff. It weighs about half as much as my toddler. I'd rather not carry it, but I'd sure hate to not have it. So do I ship it? Or maybe I should ship the toddler... ;)

Then there's everything else we're packing: If it wasn't valuable to me, I wouldn't be taking the time to ship it. Is my music collection valuable? At least 700 CDs in three boxes. But valuable? Expecting the worst means saying goodbye to everything I pack, just in case, and I will be pleasantly surprised when I get three mismatched socks back, four months late.

"More [worst] than you can imagine!"
"I dunno, I can imagine quite a bit."

Maybe my imagination for the worst is too good. Joy says, "I'm glad none of that crossed my mind before." Sorry, dear. "Well I'm a realist and if I hadn't thought of all that ... now I'm in real trouble."

This is the problem with expecting the worst.

 -- Derrill

Electronics in Jimeta

We're not unpacked yet, but we have at least started. I had thought we had a step-down transformer (changes 220V into 110V) in our home. What we actually have are stabilizers -- they make sure that even if the power grid fluctuates between 200V-250V, the appliances get a consistent 220V. Hm. So TSA nabbing our transformer is a bit worse than expected. Correction

The Wii doesn't work -- we had bought a 110V-240V adapter for it, but it was apparently not made BY Nintendo, so it's not functioning. We shall hope it isn't fried and that it will come back online in a few months when our shipment arrives with a transformer. I can't seem to find a Nintendo cord that does 240V.... My DS won't work (110V only, but I knew that), so we'll have to wait a few months to be able to recharge it. On the other hand, I did find a car charger that I might be able to use...

The VCR/DVD player doesn't work (110V only, forgot to check that), but AUN gave us a DVD player ... that won't play our purchased DVDs, only the ones my mother copied for us from TCM. Hmm. Thankfully, the computer will play the purchased DVDs ... but it had some troubles doing so today and since I was finally get my hairs cut at the time I couldn't do much about it.

The Kindle works, the computers work, the wireless internet router works, the Walkman still works (!), the camera works, my new phone works (both as a phone and as a Prince tranquilizer), the stereo system AUN gave us works. The water cooler leaks a little and we haven't figured out where to refill it (kind mentor provided us with more water today), but it works. I also checked out a Kindle from the AUN library, and it works. My new computer at school works. The internet overall shuts off now and then, but now that we have the router installed blackouts are rare. I am told that will likely change when the students are back.

For the most part we've run on the national electric grid so far, but it's needed to be supplemented by AUN's generators for large portions of the day. We had a few (<5) minutes with no power a time or two, but nothing serious. AUN also thoughtfully installed emergency lighting that turns on when the power is off.

The AC units work (happy day since we don't have fans!), but not in every room yet, and when they fixed one of them it started spitting out ice chips and water is running down two of the curtains and puddling on the floor. However, there is a high tendency for the electric circuits to blow. Our first night I reset the AC/fridge/freezer fuse more than half a dozen times. The second night after ten minutes of futzing with the three circuits, I left the living room circuit off in the hopes that the AC circuit would stay on, and it did. Tonight we're having no problems with them at all.

The most interesting device around, though, has to be the stove. Two ranges are electric, two are gas, and the oven is gas. When we moved in, we had no gas. We need to go to a dealer and refill the gas can. Our house mentor upstairs gave us some gas, though, so we're good to go for a while.

The electric is a bit more dicey. Our first morning I went to fry some eggs (AUN had provided us with bread, butter, eggs, and a few little luxuries like apricot jam). I put the high-stick metal pan on the herd and proceeded to get myself shocked. One jolt went right through my feet! The other herd, thankfully, has no such quibbles. So I can cook on LOW with electric or rather shockingly high with gas.

We tried baking the bag of meat I bought at the market. Testing out your brand new oven on the only meat in the house was a brave thing to do, but we're okay. When I checked the frozen meat 30 minutes into it, the bottom was already well done and not quite burnt with the middle frozen. I pulled it out and proceeded to fry the rest. This will take some experimentation to get used to.

We went to DisneyWorld in Feburary 2022 - a conversation

<Each paragraph begins with the name or letter of whoever says it. If there is no introductory letter, then it's me, Derrill>

My dad speaks at a regular pension conference in Orlando, Florida each February. That has become a convenient opportunity for him to take some or all of his family with for some Disney World fun. We hoped to go up in 2021, but couldn't for obvious reasons, but made it this year.

To prepare, we went back to the very beginning, Snow White, and watched all the animated Disney movies up to around the 1980s before the trip happened. This was a project we spent many months on because we watch movies so infrequently.

Joy: We also watched Youtube videos about some of the rides. The kids enjoyed that. They made a list of rides they wanted to go on at each park. We also prepared our Disney points

By spending money on our Disney credit card to get Disney dollars back

Joy: So we could spend them at the parks.

Since we had also managed a trip to DisneyLand in the summer of 21 when Aunt Virginia died, that also helped the kids, and JT especially, get ready for the larger park and get some of our favorites done in the same year at least. My brother's family joined us for the trip to Disneyland, but couldn't come for Disney World.

Superstar had been to Disneyworld and Disneyland as a toddler, but had no memory. Princess had also been to one but didn't remember. So these trips were the "first" times going to Disney for all the kids!

Pop, Emie with baby Lucy, Steve, Princess and A
JT, Grandma, Joy, Superstar, and Derrill