Can anyone explain to me the Bahian elites’ fascination with broken appliances? Another friend has noticed the same thing.
Right now I have a broken refrigerator, a broken toilet, a broken television, broken VCR and DVD players, a broken lamp, and broken lighting in three rooms. All of this is considered normal. These items might even be trophies, I am not sure.
The minister of the government I rented rooms from in the eighties had huge leaks from the roof onto the parquet floor of his signorial living room and could do nothing but throw up his hands and look on in horror.
The poetesses of the Cultural Foundation announced the brokenness of the telephones with outright pride.
What is this about?
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What is my “fix it, or throw it out” attitude about? I want the refrigerator fixed or replaced, and if it were my house I would act on this immediately. But if the television is not going to be fixed, I want the space.
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Axé.
coldhearted scientist وداد 
Now the stove is also out of gas; I thought utilities were included in this rent. It is very irritating because now I will have to have a gas tank carried up and down this rickety hill — on no coffee.
But: you call the gas man and he comes on a motorcycle, up until 10 PM.
And: the refrigerator is now working on an extension cord to a working outlet. On Saturday work on the broken electricity will begin.
Meanwhile: a local friend says one of the advantages of broken things, for some people, is that they impede work / give one an excuse to sit at work but not work. So if you are in any position to benefit from inefficiency, having (the right) things break is good.
Also: as I had figured out many years ago, if you have servants, it is a lot less important that things break / malfunction semi permanently / etc.
I think it is:
a. poor quality industrial goods in the 3d world — makes you give up, too many things arrive damaged or are flimsy, you accept brokenness;
b. the ability to inconvenience others with brokenness, which is a way to exert power if you have no other way to do so and would like to;
c. most importantly, slavery and its legacies: if you have servants, and you have a second house, and you don’t have to care about getting your work done now, than you really don’t have to worry about the broken things and can just enjoy the sunshine.
There is also the question of not having the money to fix or replace the item but not wanting to admit to oneself one cannot afford to have such an item as a standard object. So, even if the item is not fixable or worth fixing, one keeps it in its place as a kind of reminder of what one would have if one could … do you think?
And also … _everything_ is so inconvenient, that they just have to live with brokenness.