Wednesday, September 25, 2013

The Perils Of Philippine Plumbing

I have been a fairly good "old goat " lately  and not prone to engaging in " old goat " grumpiness but  i do feel a grump session about to begin , sooner rather than later . Is it just me or is Philippine Plumbing ranked high on the list of Reasons to Not Retire there ?   :-)

We recently moved to Cagayn de Oro from Iponan and one of the primary reasons was water , or too much of it , at our former location . Seems the former landlord had decided to pave a concrete driveway over the primary water line entering the house .

 I just put that decision into the rapidly filling Water " Duh " file and dealt with it as best we could . Obviously it meant tearing up a portion of the driveway and replacing water line at some cost and inconvenience .

Then there was the issue of  water getting between the roof and the ceiling and me having to bail water out of the master bedroom during a rainstorm . On second thought that series of events probably should go into a Roof " Duh " file .   :-)

Moving on into CDO i thought we had left our water problems behind us only to discover , ain't so . Turns out our new rental also has water issues though still to be determined is the extent of the problem .

Not uncommon to rent here and have to fix up a few things upon moving in as most probably know by now . Based upon my experience Maintenance in the Philippines tends to mean wait till it's broke  , then fix it .

So , we have  a plumber dude come in and unstop primary kitchen sink ( this house has two kitchens ) . Plumber says it was " mud " build up in the line . Apparently " mud " build up in water pipes is a prerequisite for Philippine Plumbing .   :-)

The plumber dude also fixes the 2nd kitchen sink that wouldn't drain properly only to discover the real problem is more complex . Something to do with the pvc pipe they installed so that you could wash clothes in doors and just have the water run across the tile floor in the 2nd kitchen to drain out . Trust me folks , i am not making this up .   :-)

Wife says she can hear water running at the water meter and with everything indoors turned off the meter does still turn . So , enter 2nd plumber who must be a real plumber because he shows up with plumber tools and represents the landlord . His inspection suggests the problem is the main water line entering the house and he will report to the house owner .

The caveat in all of this is that this house was effected by Sendong though don't know to what extent . That could well be the cause of the main line issue since no one apparently has lived here since Sendong .

 City water did replace all the water meters ( donated by Japan ) and surely flushed their lines in this area . That doesn't mean the pipes internal to the house were likewise flushed .    :-)

Growing up in the mountains of the southeastern US i am well aware of what flooding can do as we always had spring flooding when the snow melted . You knew it was coming and you were prepared to deal with it afterward .

Ironically , for a country/city surrounded by water i am not so certain the locals do ? But then again , maybe that fits into that maintenance file cabinet .   :-)

What i do know is the meter says we have consumed 17 cubic meters of water in 10 days . Doesn't sound so bad except for the fact that my wife is obsessed with turning the water off at the meter .

So , in reality we are probably only using the meter about 8 hrs a day . Doing the math does get me grumpy ...   :-)

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