Waiting patiently...

Tuesday 10 January 2012

A couple of weeks before Christmas a bubble developed in the bathroom ceiling. It continued to grow until it was dinner-plate size; it appeared to bud of several smaller ones that fortunately did not grow much more than a few centimetres across. We told our building supervisor who spoke to the chap who lives immediately above us and he looked for but did not find the source of the leak.

By this time the man had cut a hole in the large bubble, which fortunately was over our bath. We thought that it would let up over Christmas because The Man knew that the upstairs neighbour had sealed around his bath, and thought that the drip would slowly subside as there was probably a good amount of water held in the concrete between floors. Unfortunately this was not the case because when we came back after Christmas it was still dripping. When we measured the amount of water we were surprised to discover that more than 4 litres was dripping down from above. So back to the building supervisor. A couple of days later the problem was solved. The upper floors have pumps to run the sowers and our upstairs neighbours had developed a leak in the back that was causing the problem. The leak has stopped but we have a damaged ceiling the water had got under the paint and lifted it off in a circle about 400mm across. I wonder how long it will take to be repaired. I know that a builder has been in today to quite on the cost of repairs.

Hopefully it will be within a reasonable time. Across the street from us there is a shop that has been open to the elements since we have been here, ten months now. Framework is up for the front wall, which is boarded up to a height of about two and a half metres, above that it is open, providing the local pigeons and with a nice cosy weatherproof roost. Inside the builders got as far as putting up the gib and not a bit of work has been done since.