I am not very big on celebrations, commemorations, international days and I don’t think April Fool’s ranks anywhere in my “to do” list as worthy of my attention. So 1st April was a Thursday meant to pass by just like any other uneventful day. I was busy at work and never got a chance to glance at the newspaper headlines all day. Like I often do, I packed my set of dailies in my laptop bag and promised myself that I would get some time in the course of the Easter break to catch-up with the news. So there was no way I was going to avoid the fate that befell me later in the day.
My kids Gregory and Natasha were closing school on the day and Georgina, my wife was picking them up before noon and taking the rest of the day off. I had just bought the services of DSTV’s Premium bouquet the previous day, to ensure the kids were thoroughly entertained in-between the mandatory three hour homework sessions. As a family, we only get DSTV connected during the holidays because it distracts the kids from their studies. In between I may get a month or two of Compact if some interesting sports event is going on like World Athletics Championships, Cricket World Cup, or any other that catches my fancy. I don’t have a lot of time, but an occasional 20 minutes of sports highlights and CNN news on demand is all I wish for.
We had not had power for two nights prior to the day due to translocation of power cables to allow a road development in the area. So after noon I am called with a message that power came back with a surge and all our dear electrical appliances including my beloved plasma TV, hi-fi system, DSTV decoder, fridge, bedroom TV were all burnt and smoking at the back. Georgina who had called me was not able to respond to my barrage of questions on the exact location and nature of the smoke. She pleaded ignorance of “these things of yours”! I was heartbroken for my kids’ sake, because I had promised them unlimited TV viewing once they went on vacation. In return I had demanded they sacrifice even the Mexican soaps their mother loved. What was I going to tell them? With money so tight, when was I going to replace the appliances? I had heard that KPLC could pay for such losses if the surge can be attributed to their end. But how long would such compensation take?
The rest of the afternoon was a distracted affair for me and I was weighing my options. I called a few friends who I knew to have suffered such problems in the past. One broke my heart when he said that it took a whole 9 months and his lawyer’s intervention to be paid. Another was helpful and gave me the contacts of a senior officer in KPLC who could help me. Despite numerous attempts to reach the contact, he was not answering the phone. As the hour to go home drew closer, I was sensing the gravity of the situation weighing on my shoulders heavily.
Anyway, I got home at around 7 pm and on ringing the bell I was met by the saddest faces I have ever seen. There was unsettling silence in the house that would otherwise be filled by Natasha’s beloved Disney Channel’s noises or Gregory’s music videos or their mother’s soaps or gospel shows. It didn’t help that the mother was holding a book implying that she was resigned to the fate of no TV, no radio forever.
After being given an account of what happened, I was determined to get through to the KPLC contact and just as I was about to call him, he actually returned my missed calls and apologized having left his phone in the car while attending a church service. When I explained my situation urged on by the forlorn faces before me, he explained calmly that I should lodge my complaints with the Legal Corporation of the organization the next working day which was some days away. He tried to be helpful assuring me that such cases have been sorted out amicably in the past, but cautioned me that it takes time and I should not interfere with the appliances until their people had a chance to inspect them. I couldn’t even repair them in the meantime! After I hang up, I decided to reassure the family that lack of TV is not the end of the world and that I would figure out something in the next few days. They seemed to take it well.
I then excused myself to go get a drink in the fridge before promising that we would have a night of fun with games and story books and they would not even miss TV. My sympathy was heartfelt and I may have missed to notice that the fridge was working well. Neither did I notice on arriving home, the door bell was working as were the lights. That is not a sign of a house that had just gone through a devastating power surge! I also did not place the animated talk in the seating room from a threesome that had worn sorrowful faces and postures just a few minutes ago!
When I returned to the sitting room, they burst out in laughter and shouted “April fools!” with a mixture of relief and a strong urge to strangle someone, I demanded to know who the master mind of the prank was immediately. They were covering for each other, but eventually I found out it was Gregory who was aided by his mother and mischievous sister! They were beyond themselves with laughter and shouts of “gotcha, umepatikanaa, April fools”! They wanted to know why I couldn’t notice the remotes were next to the stool we use when in use or that the plasma screen was hot! Or that the bell was working, there was power everywhere. I had no answers, just a blank idiotic face full of egg. A few days later having gathered courage, I confessed to the friend who had gone through the trouble to give me a contact in KLPC that it was all a hoax. Not a very easy thing to do.
I have since recovered, but the urge to revenge is very strong and I will do so some day.
