Dave's most recent faux pas

No...it's not using your left hand to eat with in India....

So for those who weren’t aware of my internet situation, it was as follows:
There’s a room in the village town hall equivalent that has 15 or so computers, some more functional then others. For the last few weeks here I’ve been bringing my laptop (which I heartily recommend to any in the market for something cheap, tiny, and powerful, even if it isn’t a mac) there and plugging in to their ethernet cord (at the top of my list of things to bring to brazil: my own ethernet cord, as every one in this “casa digital” has to be massaged like the most delicate and perfunctory rabbit ear antenna…seriously, like holding the cord in the air at just such an angle). Anyways, so I’ve done what any addicted-to-communicating-with-friends-and-mainting-some semblance-of-contact-with-the-outside-world person would do: I befriended the gatekeeper (literally, not in the anthropological sense) to the internet center. As a result of this relationship, I’ve been trusted with the key to the internet room on the weekends, and when the room was closed. This was great, as some readers can attest, because when the center was closed it meant I had the bandwidth all to myself (which actually enabled some halfway decent conversations of late). It also created some “issues” as I was asked to lock the door from the inside, pull the curtains, and not let anyone in-under any circumstances. Of course, in a relatively small village nothing is secret for long. Ever time I entered children saw me (and likely heard me turn the blessed air conditioner on), and then proceeded to knock obnoxiously on the door incessantly for hours at a time….
Special. Very special.

Well you’re all probably wondering where this faux pas story is going and when exactly I’m going to make a fool out of myself…well, you’re wait is over!

So this entire door/lock system was completely ridiculous before I arrived (the omnipotent of you might be able to tell where this is going…). One has to lift one side of the glass door, while holding the other side down and turning the miniature key in the lock at the same time (while singing the Brazilian national anthem, which one must learn b4 travelling down here, seriously it’s a visa requirement) Anyways, so I’m done gchatting after two hours with Jo, and I go to leave…and somewhere in the two-step dance of trying to unlock the door….I break the key in the lock!

Now this is a windowless room. And there’s only one other copy of this key….and there’s a village wide party going on, which means everyone’s all over the place….and guess at what point the proverbial tables turned and I became the person knocking on the window….

Boy did that get around the village fast!