It is winter now. The long summer rainy season is over and humidity levels have dropped drastically. Time to plug in the humidifiers in the bedrooms. I put it off longer than I should have because I knew it would not be a simple task. We have three humidifiers. One came with the house and it has a skinny European style plug. One that we brought with us is from the States (okay, probably made in China, but a US brand) and has a US plug and needs a transformer to convert the voltage. The one we purchased here has a round European plug. Now, to get them plugged in and operational... Pictured are some of the many styles of adapters we have. Here in Namibia they have the most ridiculous plugs, just like in South Africa and who knows where else. The prongs are huge and make me think that these are training plugs, kind of like they make the fat crayons for toddlers. I figure out a configuration that works, but wouldn't you know it, when one of the adapters is plugged in, it turns off the power to the outlet. All of the outlets have on/off switches, and to push the adapter in far enough to make contact forces the outlet off. It took probably about 40 minutes to get three humidifiers plugged in. The outlets alone are a reason not to live here. I hope that the next place we lives has something more sensible that can use a universal adapter. I feel like I have enough adapters that I could open my own Radio Shack.
