Hanf

A radiant heater in the apartment upstairs has sprung a leak, and because the Weimanns aren't home, I went up with the plumber to look at it. I was rather disappointed when he asked if I was from America... I hoped my accent wasn't so bad. Maybe Herr Weimann told him I would meet him, and that I was from America.

After looking at the joint where the water was coming from, he was like "I need to run to the construction store to get some "hanf". I was like "What's hanf?" Incredulously, he looked at me and said "You don't know what hanf is?" Sorry dude. My plumbing supplies vocabulary isn't that big.

Downstairs, I looked it up on the internet. It's hemp.

Hemp is applied to plumbing joints in Europe, especially for the radiant heaters. I asked the plumber what the difference was between hemp and teflon plumbers tape. He told me that with hemp you can unscrew the joint a little and it will still be good. Once the joint has been tightened with plumbers tape, it cannot be unscrewed at all or it will leak. Because the joint attaching the pipe to the radiant heater has to be angled correctly, it may have to be unscrewed a little bit to get the angle right.

So, I was a little offended at his apparent disappointment in my plumbing vocabulary. But at least I know more about America than he does. He asked me where I come from in America. I told him Utah.

"Is that where the Indians come from?"

"Yeah, there were Indians there. Actually, the state was named after the Ute Indians that lived there."

"I think my company buys machinery from Utah... Wait, actually, it's from Indiana. Yes, that's the name. Indiana."

I guess they are kindof the same. Indiana and Utah. At least they are in the same country.