Happy Monday! It’s indeed a happy one because the work is coming to an end. While BF was away, we almost lost a whole week of progress.
They were building a small extension to serve as storage, with clear instructions: pour concrete on the floor, build three walls (the fourth attaches to the house), and put up a roof. They poured so much concrete that my handwashing sink is now so low it hurts my back when I use it. They also hung the roof from the main house, weakening the structure, along with making other mistakes that made us furious. Since BF was away, I didn’t know exactly what he had ordered and couldn’t explain how things should be. When they asked for the rest of the payment last Friday, I told them it wasn’t finished, which was true. Our deal was no pay until the job’s done. Good thing too because they had to redo the whole roof when BF came back.
The future storage room has a washing area that’s barely higher than my blue bucket. We don’t know why the contractor poured so much concrete; it was expensive, wasteful, and resulted in impracticalities.
This storage area is hidden from our living space by a traditional wall of wood and small stones. Watching the handyman place stones one by one to fill the walls felt as slow as watching paint dry. I think he talked to every stone, ensuring they’d have a happy life.
On the roof terrace, the new kitchen is ready, complete with a sink and a smoke room (those wooden doors at the end) where we can light a fire to smoke meat. The fire also heats the shower downstairs, making a sauna.
There were other mistakes too. Another big one was a guy who destroyed part of the floor because the door he made was too big for the frame. I told him to adjust the door to fit the house, not the other way around. He decided 6am was the perfect time to take initiative, and by 6:30am the damage was mostly done. We’ll have to varnish the whole floor again, which requires a lot of attention to detail.
Another concern is the speed at which construction materials are being used up; it’s almost as fast as when we were in full construction. I suspect one or more workers may be taking materials home. A bag of concrete is worth a day’s salary and can be used on other sites. Workers from a nearby house even offered to sell us stones they’d steal from their employer! We thought being on-site would prevent this, but it seems to be happening anyway. Though I hate the hypocrisy of their big smiles in the morning, I won’t spend two months guarding the door or performing deep searches every time someone leaves.
On a brighter note, we’ve moved from the house to the new room! We had a lot of stuff to move, but eventually, it was tidy for a while, still with the undersized mattress.
The view is incredible; it makes me want to stay in bed all day. We added a frame to the undersized mattress to fit it over the concrete bed. We used the bed it came with, cut to L-shapes to fit around the mattress, and used some blue material around it.
At the foot of the bed, we made a lovely wooden coffer to store bed sheets and towels. It’s made with beautiful local wood, and we added a bed header so we don’t hit our heads against the stones. The room stays deliciously cool, so no need for AC; the stones and earth around the walls keep it fresh during the day.
The walk-in closet is now full of stuff too! Since we’re no longer living in the house, we treated the thatched roof with poison to get rid of roaches and scorpions, painted our old room fresh for our Easter guests, rearranged the beds, and deep-cleaned the kitchen. It all looks very nice.
We’ve also taken the boat for a few rides. Initially, we had motor problems because the boat was too high for the motor’s helices to reach the water. We found a guy with a bigger, older motor that did the job and traded with him. BF brought some metal frames to fit a roof on the boat, so we now have shade and even a sail! The last time we went out, we lowered the roof’s cloth toward the bow, caught the wind, and sailed a couple of miles along the shore. It was lovely without the motor noise. BF bought a fishing rod and tried his luck, but no success yet. He’s been out a couple of times with the workers at sunset but hasn’t caught anything. The workers caught a couple of fish, but we avoid eating those because they’re bottom feeders.
How did your week go?