A couple of days ago there was a bit of a crisis at our home base here in Haiti. The town we’re in, Gonaives, had run out of gas and a car was sent to Port-au-Price to get some more. Unfortunately, we discovered that there was none to be had in Port-au-Prince either. Aaah Haiti.

We use gasoline to power our generator which, in turn, powers the internet, our electronics and the water pump, among other things. The lack of water would have made us all pretty gross but I’m sure we would have found a way to get water in buckets from nearby pumps. The idea of having no internet or power for a long period of time is what really scared me and it got me thinking about other hurdles that have led to unexpected periods of me being unproductive.

• Travel adaptor breaking in The Philippines - I found myself stranded in legaspi after a four hour flight delay. I had wanted to go to a nearby town called Donsol to be ready to swim with whale sharks the next day but, instead, was trapped in a super crappy hotel. I had brought my laptop with the intention of doing some offline work and was ready to sit down and get loads of stuff done when I realised that my travel adaptor had shat itself. At first I thought it was my power cord so I was releived that it was only the adaptor, but it meant that I couldn’t get a thing done that night because my laptop battery was dead.
• Ordering a meal in a place with broken wifi – This happens all the time but there was a spell in Chang Mai where I kept heading into cafes or restaurants supposedly with wifi, ordering a meal, and then opening my computer to find that the connection didn’t work and nobody knew how to fix it. I seem to get a lot done in cafes and restaurants and I’m always in the mood to work so it’s frustrating to not be able to get online and then have to eat a meal before heading on to another place to try again and order more stuff.
• Wifi but no powerpoints - Hong Kong airports is pretty much devoid of powerpoints except for one I found around a corner near the Ben and Jerry’s place after you go through security, I think. I had a dead battery and needed to get online to get instructions on how to get to my hostel and spent about 30 minutes wandering around the airport looking for a plug in vain.
• Power falures in Bangladesh - The town I was volunteering in in Bangladesh had pretty sporadic electricity and it would usually only be on from about 6pm until 9pm. Even then, it contstantly cut in and out. If my phone and computer were charged I could still do work in the dark but my computer screen would get dive bombed by bugs which made working pretty difficult and sort of gross.

So far these little mishaps are the worst hassles I’ve faced that have caused me not to be able to do the work I wanted to. All are out of my control and annoying, but none are realy that bad and I’m pretty thankful of that. It’s always frustrating when you’re ready to work and some silly thing stops you from reaching your desired results.

Have any of you been frustrated by a silly, small thing on the road that meant that you couldn’t get your work done?