One morning early West African morning, Gordon, a co-worker of mine at SIL, arose to find his family had lost power to their house. He went outside to look at the teleophone poles. Behold: Not only had they lost power to their house, there was no longer any power line! 200 feet or more of power line had been completely stolen during the night!
Gordon phoned the utilities company. They said that their truck had broken down, so he'd have to pick them up if he wanted the line replaced. That's what he did. On their way out, Gordon, astonished by the stolen power line, asked the men, "Isn't it dangerous for people to cut a power line?" The utilities men knodded enthusiastically, "Oh yes. It is very dangerous. Half of the time when we come to replace these lines we find a dead man next to the pole."
Shocking story? Welcome to West Africa! Just goes to show how much we take our cultural infrastructures here in the US for granted.
Posted by Eric Pyle at September 15, 2006 8:12 AM
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Passing Thoughts
West Africa might not be the only place that kind of thing happens. Our son had a similar story from his time in a Central American country, only this time it was the local church that needed a pole in order to bring the electricity to their new building. So they got a big truck and went scavanging and found a pole whose wires had already been cut, and helped themselves to it!
Posted by: thainamu | September 15, 2006 1:05 PM