They never fail

Yet again our Italian neighbours astound us with their, I shouldn’t say what I am thinking so let’s settle for lack of sense.

Many months ago we had the housing made for our new water meters at some expense.  Despite our suggestions it is located at the side of the road in a prominent and vulnerable position.  When we had our connection made, the last of the 4, we received a standard water company steel lockable door to be fitted to the cupboard.   However the opening made by the village contractor was too wide, he came and measured the opening six weeks ago with a view to fitting the door and nothing happened, you’d be a fool to expect it would.

So the cupboard stood proud on the roadside with all our meters and stop taps accessible.  We had heard of someone nearby loosing more then £500 worth of water while they were away despite having turned off the supply, they had no leaks so can only assume someone helped themselves in their absence.  We also heard that a house above us that is rarely used had been broken into and considerable damage caused.  So we really wanted the door fitted to the meter cupboard for both security and to protect the pipes in winter.

We contacted the nasty neighbour who has been ‘running’ this relocation project for a year explaining our concerns and confirming that the Acea door was waiting here in our garage.  She wrote back saying there was never an intention to fit a door, so why did the contractor measure the opening, and that Acea do not supply doors, so what is this oblong of steel we have with Acea written on it.

MrFF repeated that we have a door etc, she said if we want a door we can arrange it ourselves.  Excuse me we have the door.

Anyway after the initial reaction NN must have tried to engage her brain and a few days later wrote on our group page that the original contractor wasn’t able to complete the cupboard but his brother would have a door made by the local blacksmith and would fit it for 200 euro, to be divided by the 4 of us in the road.

Again, on the group page, MrFF wrote saying we have the door, with some adaption it could be fitted to the cupboard for a much smaller price.  NN replied that the original contractor said the door we have isn’t good quality. He never even looked at it let alone measure it and it’s standard issue, there are millions of these doors in Italy.  She also said we needed a new door because we all needed a key, the door we have has only one key.   Unbelievable.

So MrFF unpacked the door, took it up to the cupboard, placed the door in the opening and took some photographs, for the hard of understanding. He explained we only needed a metal side panel welded on and it would be fine.  He offered to organise this and work with the brother who we know and get along with fine.  He also got a little tetchy, though nothing compared to what NN assails us with, he asked her to please read what he had said (it took 3 attempts to get her to understand we had the door here) and that he is a highly qualified engineer.  He is but that means nothing obviously compared to the skills of the guy who built the housing too big, got the pipe entry in the wrong place so the water board simply knocked a new hole in the side and left two of us with connections that leaked, MrFF refitted ours himself.

NN replied at length that she had spoken to the brother who wouldn’t work with MrFF because MrFF doesn't speak Italian well, though the brother always chats to us and has been to our house for coffee in the past.  I think she made that up.  There was then a tirade about NN having run this project really well, that will be why it’s over a year now and still not finished, her mother being a pensioner, us too, all the usual rubbish.  All I can say is it has to be cheaper and more sustainable to purchase a small panel of purpose made steel than one 3 times the size, it’s ridiculous.

At the end of this debacle the other neighbour sent a message, on the group, telling MrFF that the door wouldn’t work because it’s too small.  God help us, she works for the ministry of finance.

I am thinking that we will use the door we have here to erect a small memorial to this whole crazy project, to commemorate the limited abilities of those around us, neighbours, water board and comune, and to thank them for giving me enough content to write a book if the frustration of dealing with these people doesn’t kill me first.

At Last

After 9 hours of madness on the autostrada that had my nerves jangling we got to our Italian house at 8 last night.  Grigio was here almost immediately and hasn’t left my side since, she follows me round like a little dog and never stops purring.  Sadly there is no sign of Enrico,  Mario said he hasn’t seen him for maybe a month, but we keep calling and hoping he will appear.

The water people arrived this morning as arranged and moved the meter from the snake pit  which has now been cleared of undergrowth

To the top of our road, apparently they had problems turning off the valve in the road and both got soaked

However a local contractor has to make the final connection from the meter to us, he was due at 5 this evening but it’s gone 6.  It’s not a big problem as this afternoon MrFF made a temporary connection, the taps work and I was able to wash the breakfast dishes.

I have cleaned the house, it was as always very dusty with lots of dead insects, then I spent time in the garden weeding, cutting back and moving pots into their summer position, happily a lot of plants have survived the neglect.   MrFF cut the so called lawn which is more weeds than grass and we found time for an al fresco lunch and a little pausa.  

The house was cold last night but it’s been sunny today so we’ve had the doors and windows open and it’s fine now though I will light the wood burner tonight as the nights are still cool.

Everything seems ok, it’s nice the long journey is over and a relief we have water, though why our meter shows that we used 40 cubic meters of water while we were away and our supply completely turned off at the snake pit is just another Italian anomaly.   I have no doubt there will be more of those to come.

Cross everything until Friday

We chased the neighbours again about the Italian lack of water situation, this time to be told we would not be helped because we had gone solo.  We assumed this meant because we wanted the tubes we paid for in our private road where we wanted them not where the neighbours thought they should be.  

We raised our third complaint against the water board, the first two having been ignored.  MrFF was told there had been no action because we had transferred the money for our meter to be relocated from a foreign bank account so Acea assumed it was to pay for water used, no I don’t get the logic either.  What rubbish. We quoted the appropriate references relevant to meter relocation on the payment, our usage account has not been credited with the payment and, most relevant of all, we paid the bill from our Italian account.  Acea are going to have to extend their list of fantasy excuses for failing their customer.

Eventually MrFF discovered that the other 3 houses in our road, our partners in this venture, had been connected.    More correspondence, we were told first that Acea would be phoning us to confirm we really did want the meter moved, as opposed I guess to requesting this to be done 6 times and the first 5 being a joke which they simply cancelled without notification.  We never believed they would phone us because we have a uk mobile number and Italians don’t do overseas. Then we heard Acea had phoned Mario who has never been authorised to act for us and having finally allocated the payment we made in February plan to go to our house on Friday to move the meter so the supply can be connected.

So MrFF in his trusting way has decided we will travel to Italy this week, hopefully arrive Thursday evening, with copious amounts of bottled water, and everything will be fine on Friday.  I have no faith at all, I would love to be proved wrong.  It will have taken since last June to do something that could have been completed in a week or so, should not have had to be paid for in advance without a programme of work apart from a broken promise that once we paid the work would start straight away.   For almost a year this issue has stressed and angered us in equal measure if we don’t get the water connected on Friday it might be the last straw, in fact if it wasn’t for the cats I’d probably stay in Yorkshire.

Italian idiosyncrasy

We hadn’t heard anything about the Italian water situation for a while so this week MrFF contacted the neighbour who has the contract with Acea, the water authority.  We have now paid for our meter to be relocated and had the necessary pipes installed in our private road, as far as we know that is because of course getting definite information is impossible.

The neighbour replied immediately saying she is a polite person and has not been updating us because of our subterfuge. I assume she refers to the fact that we decided where we wanted our pipes in our private road and insisted on that.  She said she was only keeping the other, obviously more submissive than us,  neighbours informed but would tell us that she has a meeting with Acea next Friday.  We replied with a thank you, see we can be polite too.

We then contacted one of the other neighbours who understands the water board are coming out to check the quality of the water.  Our supply comes from an underground source up the mountain, there is no cleaning system, never has been and we have never known the water to be analysed.  Since our so called condominium of 4 properties had so far expended about 20,000 euros to relocate our meters it might have made sense to check the water before this happened.  But then the uk version of sense, like the Italian version of politeness, is different.

Life’s ups and downs

Amazingly almost 6 months since we made the first of 6 identical applications and 3 site visits later we finally received the document to allow us to connect to the new water supply, we paid it immediately.  This at least means we can make a temporary overground connection when we arrive to serve our needs even if we simply continue as we were filling irrigation tank once a week for household use.  

Meantime the Italians play Chinese whispers, Mario it seems reported to one neighbour that we intended paying 930 euro or whatever it is to take our pipe down the road behind our house.   We had a message from the most troublesome neighbour asking if we wanted to do this, we’d already told her no.   Apparently the work due to start on Tuesday didn't, we are not sure if they are holding off hoping we will cave in and save them 300+ euros each.

In other news the computer wouldn't work at all early in the week, MrFF spent a lot of time trying to fix, unsuccessfully trying to find a PC in our building he could use and visiting the local computer shop.  Yesterday he got it going and worked most of the day restoring stuff, today it’s completely dead again.

I have had some horrible virus, cold like symptoms with the added benefit of a banging headache and nausea.  I had to take to my bed on Tuesday and didn’t eat for 24 hours.   MrFF produced a small slice of pizza and a jacket potato for my dinner, I brought that up straight away.  I am on the mend now and pleased to report I’ve lost 4 lb during my involuntary detox, all the Christmas excess gone and so far I have very little appetite.

I haven’t been outside for 3 days and wondering if a gentle stroll and some fresh air might be in order, maybe I should wear a mask. I’ll leave you with my lovely amarylis definitely a great result. 

We give up

We have given up trying to negotiate with our neighbours, we have opted out of the  communal contract for installing the water pipes in our road.  After been constantly told what we can have, our plans being ignored, we were finally offered a pipe that would cross the road opposite our house but none of the inspection chambers we asked for and no connection to the house just a few meters of exposed pipework left for us to sort it.  We were prepared to pay the cost of this work but were told it was too expensive, I translate that as too difficult.

The final straw was being told that despite reducing the total pipework by more than half the, price would be the same.  We were also told that our existing supply would be disconnected and that work is starting on Tuesday.

So now we have no offer of connection to the new supply from the water authority, no pipework to our house and most probably our existing pipes have been damaged when the new supply was installed - welcome to Italy.  

The neighbours have to split the cost of the work between 3 instead of 4, it’s now 1250 euro each.  It’s defies logic that they can’t work out that they need 25% less pipe and a 25% smaller trench so there should be some adjustment.  The first neighbour in the road who is a few meters from the new meter location is happy to pay for her pipes to travel down the road, connect to the old leaky 40 year old pipes under the road at the chamber and travel back in them to her house parallel to the new pipes.  It’s not just the cost it’s the unnecessary amount of pipework under the road vulnerable to damage as they are not buried deep enough plus the problem of finding any leak under the tarmac.

I am so happy to be free of this nonsense even if we have no outcome, my life is too short to continue Arguing with donkeys.  MrFF has provided a lot of information and evidence to help this project succeed but the neighbours know better.  After sending us various emojis that we didn’t understand, the parting shot from the worst neighbour was that when we install our pipes we must not damage hers and if we do she will claim damages.  Maybe she forgets that her husband broke Giovanni’s pipes last year when repairing one of their leaks.  Giovanni’s water was off for half a day while they made a repair, we can do that if we have to and I can check with Giovanni how much compensation he received, nothing.  She also forgets that it works both ways and they need to take care for our pipes.  

Now we have to wait to see if we can get the documents to connect to the new supply, the Tecnico is coming out again on Thursday.  Please don’t hold your breath this is only our sixth attempt.

Water torture

I can hardly bring myself to write any more about the dire water situation in Italy.  We had some hope recently when we heard that Acea were actually starting work.  It took only a few days for them to install the new supply pipe to the top of our road, during which time no one bothered to check the work or that the supply was the correct size, we simply received photographs that told us nothing.

Then Mario reported that he had spoken to the contractors who said they were installing only 3 meter points and of course we discovered the missing one was ours.  By this stage we had applied 5 times for a connection, 5 times our application had been cancelled without notification, we applied again yesterday.  Meantime the neighbours are getting irate as if we are doing this on purpose.  We can do nothing until we receive an estimate for the connection which is also the contract with the necessary document to make a payment.   No one helps us,  we raised a complaint against Acea because they were failing to respond within the time scale of their own service statement, in fact failing to respond at all, a neighbour told us to stop complaining to Acea as if it’s any of her business.

Then we were told the 4 pipes in our road, that will cost us another 1,000 euro on top of the 4,000 already paid last November, would go down to the chamber beyond our property where we could link into the old pipe to run the supply back up under the road to our property.  We have explained the existing pipe cannot be used as it has a leak that we cannot find under the road.  We were told there are no leaks under the road, which is nonsense.  We fixed one leak last year and there are visible repairs we’ve made over the years and patched the asphalt.

MrFF has 3 times sent to the neighbours a scale drawing he prepared of our proposal to bring all the pipes down the road and t off to each property.  Apparently no one has even looked at his drawing though one neighbour said it would be expensive, presumably through some super power.

Then yesterday MrFF received a really abusive email from a neighbour saying it was alright for us as we are retired but she has a job and a family and cannot be doing with our interference.  I am furious that she makes assumptions about our life, she has no idea of our obligations and pressures. She went on to say we can do what we like but the pipes are going in next week and if we connect later we better not damage theirs.  She suggested we jump on a flight and sort things out, presumably she wants us to live in a hotel until we have water.

I am distraught, I feel constantly tense and neither of us is sleeping.  We want to get back to finish work on our terrace, we want to see our cats.  We knew when we paid up for this hair brained project it was a recipe for disaster but we could find no alternative.  I’ve said it before, there is no wonder Italy is full of abandoned houses that the government tries to sell off for a euro, some days I’d happily take a euro for ours just to be free of the stress.  If you are interested you also have to take good care of our cats and put up with some unpleasant neighbours who fortunately are not always in residence.

The die is cast, maybe

Yesterday was D day, decision day on the water.  Reluctantly we have agreed to pay our share, 4000 euros, towards the cost of moving the 4 meters to the top of our road. We were not swayed by the various threats of what would happen if we didn’t join the other neighbours in this exercise, that if we changed our minds later we would have to pay 16,000 instead of 4,000, or even the rather more sinister suggestion we would be left with a very unhappy feeling, which would be a change from the frustration and rage we’ve been feeling for weeks.  We went ahead because actually not having the meter in the snake pit therefore a shorter length of pipe to be responsible for is a benefit.  But the main reason is that we are certain that when the contractors start excavating to install the new single pipe to the new meter location they will destroy our existing pipes and we would come back next year to probably no water and an almighty battle to sort that.    

We are still furious and have no idea about the next stage of the work, pipes from the new meter location to our houses which we residents must arrange.  The water company refuse to give us a quote for connecting to the proposed new meter and without that we cannot pay, in advance of course, to be connected.  Our neighbour has a quote, we applied weeks ago and our last two emails have been ignored.  

We haven’t paid the money yet, which we must put into our neighbours bank account without any paperwork although we will make some note on the transfer.  We have no expectations of any kind of receipt.  The only start date for the work was given verbally at the meeting, straight away when we pay.  I interpret that as sometime next year and hope to be proved wrong.

Unrelated to the water, I read in the paper this morning that Silvio Berlusconi who will be part of Italy’s new coalition government is boasting of his recently renewed friendship with Putin.  There has been an exchange of lovely letters and Vlad has declared Silv one of his top 5 best friends.  Things are pretty pear shaped government wise in the UK at the moment but there’s a long way to go before we reach this level.

I promise the next post will be a knitting one, even if there is more craziness and there probably will, we need some balance.  I’ve broken my own rules and have two projects on the go as I knit to be calm, as recommended by Weave.

Trust me I’m an Italian

We went to the meeting today about our water.  Anna was there with 4 others, family and friends, also Pietro and Stella, us 2, the Acea man and 2 Comune people. Also there was Mara who has helped us in the past to offer translation, we’ve spoken to her by phone a few times but never met her, she was adorable.

The meeting was called for 3.30, we residents all arrived in good time and waited until 4.10 before anything happened.  There was a lot of shouting and talking over each other, people were keen to retell how many leaks they’d had and the hours of work to locate and fix them.  I soon lost the will to live (in Italy) but I did take some notes, these will amuse you.

We’d been told Acea were aware of our concerns and that we weren’t happy with their proposal but it was clear nothing had changed, it was take it or leave it so the meeting was pointless.  These are some of the responses.

We can only have one quotation one client and one bill for the 4 houses in our road because for the purpose of the contract we are a condominium, they agreed we are in fact 4 unconnected houses and not a condominium but the offer doesn’t change. 

Because Acea are a public company they can only work on public land, in fact they are a private company and we know of several local properties that have meters in their private gardens or in their houses. When we asked again about the legislation they said there is nothing written but it’s a verbal rule.

Although they have quoted for 25 mm diameter pipe which is sufficient for only one house they will in fact provide a 60 mm pipe but they won’t revised their quotation to confirm this and we must sign up to the original offer, at least Anna does because the rest of us don’t sign anything we just cough up the money.

They cannot run the new tube down the gully and place the meters half way down our road, because it is illegal to have water pipes in a gully.  We did explain that they are well aware our supply has come down the gully for 30 years and no one has ever challenged it.

We asked about the additional cost of work to run pipes from the meters at the top of our road to our houses, we have to arrange that between us, manage and coordinate the work with the new meter installation, I’ve no idea who is going to do that.

We asked when the work would take place and Acea said as soon as they have the money, yeah right.

We also asked what would happen if we paid for the new pipe and then some others nearby wanted to connect to it for 87 euro.  Anna said they wouldn’t be able to do so as we’d paid for the pipes and they were ours, of course they will belong to Acea we just pay for them.  

The two sets of neighbours present are keen to go ahead, we and the third neighbour who was not there have our doubts. We were asked for our decision but said we hadn’t made one, we have to decide by next week.

Its completely against our culture to pay in advance for something so vague without contract or control, a real recipe for disaster.  The other 2 families say if we don’t agree they will go ahead and we cannot connect to the system later, we wouldn’t try do that it would be immoral.  We got the impressions they were bluffing and trying to pressurise us, if we and the absent neighbour don’t go ahead the other 2 would be looking at at least 10,000 euro each, Pietro and Stella are here for less than 4 weeks a year so that’s lot of money.  

What will we do, I have no idea, I’m open to suggestions.

Water, water, water

I’m not sure that you want me to keep ranting about our water problems, I’ll try to be brief although the situation does seems to occupy us constantly and has many complex issues.

We made it clear we weren’t willing to hand over almost 4000 euros to our neighbour, our quarter of the costs to move the 4 meters from the mountainside to the top of the road, with no legal paperwork and no timescale for completion.   Actually the quotation was for a single pipe sized for one property to which we should all 4 connect, according to UK standards it should be twice the size quoted, and what’s to stop them once the pipe work is installed from saying it’s just for one house and we each actually have to pay 16,000 euro.

We had submitted our own application for a price for the work but Acea, the water people, said they couldn’t give us a quotation until we installed the meter housing ourselves. At the same time they made an appointment to visit our immediate neighbour, who doesn’t have the necessary meter housing to give her a price (and they’d already given the price of almost 16,000 euro to the other neighbour who doesn’t have a meter housing ready either).  So MrFF got in touch and said since they were going to be here they could give us a price at the same time.  Our immediate neighbour asked them to do the same thing for us, she wasn’t able to attend and appointed MrFF as her trusted person to meet the Tecnico and discuss details.

The appointment, this was over a week ago, was according to the email for between 12 and 2, or between 2 and 4 according to the attachment, best to cover all the afternoon.  I was working in the front garden by 12 and dashed to the balcony to tell MrFF when I heard a car, by the time we’d walked back round our house the man had left.  MrFF phoned him and he said we’d need to contact the office to arrange a separate visit. Obviously he never had any intention of giving us a price.  When we contacted the office they said we’d need to have a meter housing in place before they could price, what a situation, a stern email has been sent, we’ve had no reply.    They also said we couldn’t have our own price and our own bill for our share of the pipework as it was one job so could only have one customer.  

Our neighbour let us know that she received quotation of 87 euro, which is the standard charge for linking into an existing supply, it didn’t need a visit from a Tecnico to tell her that, it’s on the website.  

Now a meeting has been arranged for Tuesday next week by our Comune for all 4 residents in our road to meet with Acea at the little town hall.  We asked what the intention of the meeting is as we cannot accept the current situation where we fork up the money before work begins to a neighbour, have no contract so no control or comeback if things go wrong, have to co ordinate the installation of water pipes from the new meter down our road,  probably while we are back in the UK and accept a supply that is sufficient for one house to supply 4, with the possibility that once the major work is done other houses in our area, mostly currently not occupied, could later link in at a cost of less than 100 euro further depleting the supply and contributing nothing to the major expense. 

If the new meters are housed at the top of our road we still need pipes laid running under our road, we’d have to to arrange this betwden us and still be responsible for any leaks from the new meters to our properties, granted a much shorter run than up to the existing snake pit meter housing but still a concern.  As I said we probably won’t be here to see the work done, if it’s to the same standard as the existing pipework we shall still have problems and be many thousand of euros lighter.  We again asked if the meters could be located outside our houses so that Acea would be responsible for all the pipework.  They insist they cannot lay pipes on private property, our road is not adopted by the Comune, but have so far not been able to point us to evidence or legislation that this is the case, since we’d all be in agreement and give our permission it must be feasible.

The Comune have set up some WhatsApp group where we can all speak with each other, one neighbour isn’t participating, one is as concerned as we are and one, the person who would have the contract just wants to crack on.  In fact her daughter was rather rude to us last week and asked if we were angling to have the contract in our name and for her to give us her share.  She obviously doesn’t understand the issues, no one in their right mind pays out that amount of money without some binding agreement and I cannot see that she or her mother will be up for managing the Acea contract and coordinating the second contract for pipes in our road.  All we’ve seen is a 2 line quotation and a sketch I think was done on the back of a fag packet.  The daughter also said we should stop talking to each other and just resolve the matter because as they are now the houses cannot be lived in.   Excuse me we are living here and while it’s a hassle we are coping by filling our irrigation tank once a week and using that for the bathrooms, cleaning etc and bottling water for drinking when the supply is on, the rest of the time our mains supply is turned off so we are not loosing water from the various leaks we have.    We all want things resolved but we won’t make rash decisions, if the work had been done properly in the first place we wouldn’t have had 20 years of fixing leaks and extortionate bills for lost water, which we refused to pay.  

To be blunt we do not trust Acea, not least because their charter says they will never disconnect a water supply, yet they did disconnect a friend nearby when it was discovered there were two properties on one meter and earlier this year they disconnected the 4 houses in our road saying we didn’t have contracts.   Some of the residents have had contracts for 30 years and even when we were disconnected they continued to take payments from us all.  In every one of these case there was no consultation or notification, although we later found a hand written note on a torn piece of paper in the snake pit saying we’d been disconnected and a number to call.  This is the customer service we are up against, it’s appalling and I need to brush up in my Italian to be able to tell them so on Tuesday.  It’s bad enough being expected to fork out this kind of money just to have a decent water supply which in a major European country should be a given, not being listened to and being treated with such disdain is infuriating.  See, it’s impossible to write about this without producing yet another massive rant.

Lack of water update

Since I last posted about the water we’ve had two more visits by representatives of our provider Acea, that’s 3 in total, each has said something different and nothing has been done.

Last week we heard that Anna at the bottom of the road had received a quotation for the work which her family emailed to us.  It was basically two lines, the cost of supplying a single pipe sufficient for one property to the top of our road and the cost of one meter box. The housing and support for the meter and obtaining permissions for the Comune would be Anna’s responsibility and the money almost 16,000 euro was to be paid now despite no timescale for the work.  At first Anna asked the other 3 properties to put their share into her bank account so she could pay. We refused to do so, if anything happened to her we’d have no claim against her estate without some written legal agreement, even then it could take years, if Acea defaulted we’d have no contract with them and if work proceeded and we then asked to be connected at the new location, at a further cost, they might say the supply wasn’t sufficient.  To their credit when we explained the neighbours realised this and replied to Acea asking for more detail as did we.

Nothing happened so we contacted the Comune who had said they would help in any negotiations, they suggested another meeting.  Again we explained we have to turn off our supply and store water to avoid the expensive leaks, we’ve had three ineffective meetings, we want no more talk we want a proper water supply. They didn’t like that and said it wasn’t helpful, they have since ignored us.  However they have been applying pressure to a neighbour, raising issues like a manhole built maybe 30 years ago without permission and the fact that because we 4 properties are on a private road the refuse collectors shouldn’t come to our houses to collect our rubbish though no doubt they will continue to charge us.  So far they still collect but now we are the only ones in the road, everyone else has left and all the meters are turned off.  I would have no problem taking our rubbish to the top of our private road, I only use 4 of the available 6 days a week collections as I compost a lot and have no food waste being from Yorkshire.  But others here are elderly, not so mobile and when resident would face a long uphill walk with their refuse.

When you see the number of abandoned properties here and in fact in the whole of Italy just think it’s probably because of stupid legislation and bureaucracy, people can’t fight forever they have to get in with their lives and they leave.   I’ve said before we are a village of 3000 people we have our own town hall with 40 staff, yet no one can do anything to provide probably half the population with a decent water supply.  Some days I cannot wait to get back to Yorkshire, living in Italy can be exhausting.

Getting nowhere

About 3 weeks ago we received an hours notice that representatives of the water authority and our Comune would be at the top of our road at 1.30 for a meeting with residents to discuss the water situation.  We dropped everything to attend and just one hour late at 2.30 the officials arrived, without apology or explanation for their lateness. There was heated discussion with everyone speaking at once. The water board didn’t want to talk about how they cut everyone off without consultation or the fact two of us have so many unlocated leaks we are having to store water and turn off our supply. 

Their solution is to run a single pipe down the mountainside under the road for which they would become responsible instead of us, and to locate new meters at the top of our road with individual pipes from there to the houses for which we would be responsible.  Quite honestly and as no surprise to me they talked a lot of rubbish, the Comune man had no idea what land was public and what private and the water men as every other official here said no to any more practical suggestion.  MrFF had to put them right a few times, it felt quite hopeless.  

The final outcome was that the water board said they would provide us in a few days with a price for all the work, which the 4 properties in our road must pay though we will have no control over what happens or the cost.  The Comune will consider making a contribution as they had been responsible for approving the original stupid installation.  I cannot imagine they will pay anything because so many other properties are in this situation. 

At the end of the meeting everyone was pleasant, we all shook hands, they said it was a pleasure to meet MrFF and some of the residents actually embraced the Comune man.  I just wanted to knock all their heads together.

Of course we heard nothing more until last Thursday whilst on the beach.  We had a message that the water board had done nothing and now requires an official completed application of many pages asking them to move the meters.   They will then come out to look at the situation, submit a price and round we go again.

First the neighbours asked if only we would complete the form as for some reason two of the accounts were in the names of people who had been dead for at least 15 years. We declined because we got the feeling we might end up administering the whole thing, be responsible for payment and allocating costs and probably not be in Italy (if I have anything to do with it) so we suggested the residents update their details and complete their own applications.

This week MrFF completed our application, it needed everything they already have, account details, tax codes, contact details, copy of our passports.  We believe that one other resident has done the same,  we have heard nothing.

At least the weather is cooler, now mid 20s, it’s really pleasant so I have been gardening and MrFF has tackled various maintenance work whilst fretting about the balcony.  We’ve had some rain, that has of course poured into the room below the balcony which is now without tiles or screed.  I try not to go down to that room as it’s so awful but 2 days after the last heavy rain I could still hear water dripping.  However I’m sleeping well, feeling fine, trying not to stress, missing the penthouse and dreading leaving the cats, just another day in Italy.

Update

Where did we get to with the water leak situation, we had friends to stay for a week so we took some welcome time out but now it’s back to work.   Finding no 4 was impossible, MrFF cleared the pipe route of undergrowth twice and we searched for a damp area but found nothing.  So he bought another 250 euro worth of plastic pipe and with help from Giovanni has bypassed another section with pipe on the surface.  This isn’t ideal and certainly won’t be in winter but the alternative was costly water wastage.  Here is the car loaded ready for action.

Once the work was done MrFF checked the meter, we have leak no 5.  This one is in the gully where we already have a bypass section or possibly under the road, it needs more investigation.

We had the first major wildfire last week, 48 hours of helicopters and planes dropping water.  Fortunately for us it was on the opposite side and well out of the village, worrying nonetheless.  Our Comune had recently installed a large open  water tank in the valley to reduce the time it takes for the helicopters to collect water, within days it was put to use.

Photo from our Comune website

Because of the drought animals are desperate for water, I keep several outside water stations topped up for the cats.  However the wild animals don’t use them preferring to uproot garden and pot plants in search of moisture and roots.  Our neighbours had told us wild boar were digging under fences to get to water pipes.  Yesterday my newly planted kiwi was out of the ground, today tomato plant roots are exposed in the orchard, even outside Enrico’s beloved hotel Splendido where he likes a summer display soil and plants have been turned out, Enrico probably slept through.

Some days if feels like we live in the Wild West, we are pioneers trying to scratch a living while being constantly beaten back by nature and man made problems, sadly my spirit of adventure is just about worn out.

Checking the meter

We are now re-connected to our water supply via 15 metres of above ground pipe that bypasses the underground leak we cannot find.  I am very grateful to have the water back and that MrFF resolved this for us albeit temporarily.

If you are reading this Acea, our water provided, can I just point out that the residents in this area are all in their 70s, some in their 80s, some late 80s.   How the hell are they supposed to traipse up the mountain to read their meter, lift a heavy metal manhole cover off the pit, and lean into the deep chamber as MrFF demonstrates below.  

And how dare you impose a standing charge for this ramshackle arrangement whereby you tap into a local spring,  stick on inaccessible meters and never check the quality of the water which is not treated in any way.  You had the nerve to keep taking our money even when you disconnected us for 2 months saying we had no contract despite us being your customers for the last 20 years.    You installed our metres half a kilometre from our house to make us responsible for the badly installed pipe work through a jungle of undergrowth and under roads down the mountainside.

Please don’t trouble yourselves responding to this complaint, you’ve never done so in the past, we have no expectations of customer service.

Your publicity about providing clean water from springs checked by satellite is nonsense, your seem ignorant of your failings. The quality of our water hasn’t been checked in 20 years.  Despite stating that the meter must be read at least twice a year we’ve had estimated bills for the last 14,  the meter readers can never find the snake pit or are too afraid to go there or don’t turn up at all on the dates we are advised to give them access which presumably means we should hack out a route to the pit.

If we die from dehydration or some water borne disease somebody please pass this post to the appropriate authority, preferably not an Italian one.  Thank you.

Another water leak

MrFF went to do his regular meter check last night to discover we have our third water leak since we arrived.  Again it’s in the gully, we went out to do our usual scratch and search but this time we couldn’t find the leak.  By 8.15 last night we gave up, I came home to start dinner while MrFF turned off the supply as we are losing so much.

After further investigation this morning has MrFF determined the leak is in the top 15 metres of the gully where it’s steep and rocky.  It rained overnight so now finding a damp area is even more tricky so he’s gone to the builders yard for supplies and for now is going to bypass the leaking section with a temporary overground pipe.  At least we shall be able to wash and I can tackle the pile of washing up in the kitchen.  We made tea this morning with bottled fizzy water, not recommended.

It’s hard to believe this is happening. Water is such a huge issue here, not that we ever run out even in the driest spell it’s just the problem of getting it to our home.  I could walk from our house to properties that have been built with no water supply at all yet we are only 40 miles from the capital city.  Hindsight is a wonderful thing but if we’d known 20 years ago it would be like this we’d have made our own arrangements then, like bought a house in France.