3.23.2011

HHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!

So we had a kind of rough day and decided that we would go out to dinner, to Marua mall. We parked where we did last time, you know, that time the car died and it rained really hard?! So we double checked to make sure all the lights were turned off, and they were.
We enjoyed a good dinner, with commentary from an "Olive Oil for hair" campaign that was going on across the mall.

After the dinner it started raining softly as we walked to the car and got it.
David turned the key, and all we heard was a faint clicking sound. And then the lightning flashed and the rain started to pour out in buckets again!!
David worked on the battery for a little while, it seems we have a bad connection, but to no avail. We asked some people who were parked close to us for a jump, they came over and gave us the jump,  but alas once again the car was deader than a door knob.

They left, after the obligatory sheepish looks, and the rain started to come down harder.

At this point David's teeth started chattering from the cold, so he did what anyone would do, he started knocking on different things in the engine with a metal tool, from his toolbox (this is key later in the story), and it worked...a little bit.

We were then able to turn on the dash lights! It was like a sad, cold, and wet Christmas :)
David decided that perhaps a jump start would work now, so he walked in the rain to the front of the mall door to ambush people as they walked out. EVERY SINGLE person said no! It was absolutely ridiculous. David even told them they would not even have to get out of their cars, he would do it all. It was a sad day for Namibian reputations. Some people even refused to make eye contact with him.
So we did what we had to. We called Adam. Again. (At this point our heads are hanging in shame).
He agreed to come out immediately (like he always does, so helpful!).

THEN someone actually agreed to help us! It was a man on a roadtrip, he actually had a reason to say no! He also had his lady friend with him, in hindsight I think perhaps he said yes so that he could impress her.
AND it worked! The car jumped to life (we are considering renaming it Lazarus), and we could finally get home.
We drove out of the parking lot (after calling Adam and sharing our fantastic news) high on life! It was a great feeling!
But alas, as we turned the corner we heard a strange sound, it sounded like an open toolbox that had been used to try and revive a dead battery and then had been placed on the roof of the car in a hurry hitting the wet road, a very strange sound to hear. But then David stopped and we looked back on the dark shiny road, and there in the dark lay our toolbox, splayed open with rivets and wrenches and screwdrivers and screws littering the street.
So we did what anyone would do, we abandoned our car and ran to the tools like crazy people.
There we were crawling around on the street, in the dark, in the pouring rain, looking for lost nails and abandoned hammers.
It was quite hilarious.
Then a man drives up and is so nice that he shines his headlights on the street for us, and then leans out of his window to point at lost tools while honking his horn to alert us to the whereabouts of our tools. Really helpful, especially the honking was helpful.

So I don't know if I have told you guys about our South African anti-hijacking alarm system. But we have one that will start to bleep for 90 seconds to warn the hijaker and then it will cut the power to the car if the car is ever hijaked.

So as we are crawling around with Helpful Henry honking his horn at us the alarm starts to bleep. Now we know if we don't get to the car in time the engine will cut out and we will be back to square one, except this time square one will be in a dark alley rather than a lighted parking lot.
So David looks at me with panic written all over his face. He yells grab these and throws the tools in my direction, then he kicks off his shoes is wreck-less abandon and takes off down the street towards our car. 
Picture this, you come up to a couple crawling in the road, you figure out that they are looking for shiny pieces of metal so you give them a hand, all of a sudden the guy jumps up thrusts mangled tools in the woman's hands and runs away like a crazy person.
I do wish I had the ability to read minds, so that I could know what Helpful Henry thought at that point. Perhaps he thought that David was a thief and was trying to get away, or that he had the sudden urge to go to the bathroom! I of course am cracking up at this point, so yes, we look like two complete nutters.
I am sure we will now meet Helpful Henry in the next week. He will either be a government official or the pastor of a church, and he will recommend counseling to us :)

David's mad dash did pay off though, he got to the car in a nick of time! We drove home, and now we are trying to get warmed up again.
HAPPY ONE YEAR ANNIVERSARY TO US!

Thankfully our home was not flooded when we got home. Here is a picture of David, he is soaked through.

2 comments:

Stephen and Alisa said...

oh my! At least with your car dying all of the time you have some real interesting stories to blog about!!!! Hope that you can get a better connection to your car battery!

David Echols said...

Ok, so I think I got it fixed. We should be fine til the next time we have a rough day and decide to go to Merua Mall to recoup.