On March 10th 2020 rumors were swirling that campus would close, but we hadn’t gotten any official word yet so the energy was all over the place. I was in my Advanced Seminar in Romanticism taught by the wonderful Dr. Einat Adar in the Letenska 1 building.
All was fine given the anxiety but there was also a curious excitement about this novel situation we were in and the break came and as per usual with my minuscule bladder I made my way to my beloved library bathroom where up to that point I’ve spent more pee breaks than any bathroom on campus. I did my business and went to wash my hands with the fancy new antibacterial soap that the school had purchased. I then went to turn off the sink and AS SOON as I put the level down the whole handle BURST OFF THE FAUCET and a high-powered stream of water began to shoot up to the ceiling. In absolute shock, I stood there for a few seconds, drenched in awe of what had just happened, perhaps the most absurd and insane event to befall me in my never-ending five-year-and-counting-long career at Anglo-American University. Water EVERYWHERE, the floor slowly accumulating a decent-sized puddle that was turning into a river. Stage two of my emotional shock had my idiot self trying desperately to jam the faucet back onto the geyser hole where it once sat. My mind, realizing I wasn’t stressed enough, decided to calculate how much the school was going to charge me for this little adventure into the world of property damage I decided to have that fine afternoon.
After my fight mode whittled down, I decided it was too late and all hope was lost, my flight mode kicked in and I BOOKED IT to the library where I, still soaked, somehow tried to gather myself to explain even remotely coherently to the librarian at the time that “I’m so sorry to bother but um I think that the faucet just exploded on me and the bathroom is flooding.” We both ran out to the bathroom to assess the situation. Meanwhile, the construction crew on the floor above us became aware of the situation and my class had now emerged to also gawk at the surreal image of now both the men’s and women’s bathroom having a pleasant water feature spanning the entire floor, spilling into a lovely waterfall cascading to the from the walkway to the ground floor. The pair of construction workers above us ended up coming down to figure out what to do. After my classmates and I had our fun taking videos we went back to class and I, still soaking wet, had to sit there the rest of class with the horror of what I had done. After class, I went back to inspect the scene of my crime which thankfully hadn’t started growing its own ecosystem and had calmed down thanks to the help of the talented gentlemen from above.
I went back to the librarians to apologize profusely again and accept any and all punishment no matter how severe for the disaster I brought upon my beloved library bathroom. My guilt was relieved somewhat by their explanation that it was most likely the very construction saviors whom I had crowned as angels who through their workings on the second floor likely caused an increase in water pressure, resulting in my mid-day shower. I was simply an innocent bystander who was at the wrong place at the wrong time, chosen as the unwilling sacrifice to Gods of urban redevelopment. Was it an omen for the bad times to come? Perhaps. Have I learned my lesson and will never use a faucet of that similar make ever again? Absolutely.
The very next day students were banned from campus and the rest is history.
