Electrament

I remember the lights went and the only light came from a single flickering candle. No one jumped, no one wondered aloud why the lights went out, everyone continue talking and eating as if nothing had happened. A few moments later the lights came back on and people continued chewing and talking, laughing and sighing.

I remember walking into the grocery store, a store that could have fit into Wal-Mart's shoe department, and it was dark except for the light that spilled in through the windows. And as my teammate and I picked up canned vegetable and compared the prices of various beans, the electric lights came back on, refrigerators and freezers started to hum, and again no one commented.

I remember one of the girls I lived with, Emberly, saying "We used to be excited when the electricity went out, now we are excited when it comes on."

I remember thinking that you knew you lived in N. Iraq when your cell phone came equipped with a flashlight.

And so life goes in Northern Iraq, sometimes there is electricity, sometimes there isn't. Sometimes it comes on for an hour, sometimes it comes on for three. When it comes, and when it goes, no one knows.

Though I knew about the sporadic power, I wasn't really prepared for what life would be like without reliable electricity. Sometimes we'd be at friends houses and the power would come on and our friends would excuse themselves as they hurried to put a load of laundry in the washer while there was power. Other times the power would go out and you could hear the beep of a battery back up device echo through the house, alerting the owner to come and turn off the computer.

My teammate, Colleen, and I invented the term "electrament" to describe when someone becomes aclamated to random power outages. When I first arrived in N. Iraq, the power would go out and I would gaze around thinking "The power just went out. I wonder what happened." I would have to stop and think "Okay, where is my flashlight? Is my computer plugged in and turned on? When will the power come back?" But over time, I settled into electrament and soon when the power flickered on or off, I also continued chewing and talking, laughing and sighing.