Working and Living in South Africa
It looks completely like winter in Cape Town today. Complete with heavy dark grey clouds, high winds and rain.
Rain in Cape Town during winter…who would have thought.
I’m loving it though. Until it’s time to go home!
Not a fan of air conditioning or heaters at home. So its blankets and duvets and hot water bottles.
This morning I woke up at exactly 07.05 – bit later than I normally would as I’m on holiday.
As usual I looked up at the digital clock to check the time, only to be greeted by flashing numbers.
A sure sign of a power failure!
The numbers on the clock indicated that power had been restored an hour and 5 minutes earlier.
But it was raining and the wind was howling. An explanation only a fellow citizen of this fine city will understand. (For the rest of the planet: in Cape Town rain affects our brain functions.)
And being me and Capetonian and from the Southern Suburbs, I immediately went into panic mode.
“What if power hadn’t been restored before I had my coffee?” Heaven forbid!
“I have to go out TODAY and get a flask, camping light and gas stove.” All this while still laying in bed.
Half an hour later…
“Better go make that coffee. NOW!”
Which I did while checking Twitter on my Blackberry.
(Better add a gas charger for my phone to that list.)
Turns out I wasn’t the only concerned Capetonian. But what surprised me more than anything was the fact that there were Capetonians up at 5am when the power failure occurred.
“Who are these people”, I wondered. “Immigrants from up north?”
A mug of coffee and no sign of another power failure restored some sanity.
But I wondered how our two nuclear reactors were doing. (See, we treat those reactors at Koeberg as family members. Their health is of extreme concern to us. And we get occasional updates in the media.)
“Unit one is having routine maintenance,” might seem, well… routine to the average South African.
The average citizen of Cape Town frowns worriedly.
“Routine my arse!”
“The ANC is victimising us again.”
“There’s a reason Koeberg was built in Cape Town.”
Or
“What are they not telling us?”
Let me tell you: our legendary laid back status is conditional. It only applies when we can wear shorts, both Koeberg units 1 and 2 are fully functional and when it’s a working day.
I don’t know how the rest of the country survives these blackouts, but here in Cape Town we take it personally. Some of us even take winter personally.
Btw. I did go out to the shops today, but came back with a pizza, coke and Doritos. I have to stock up on necessities in case there’s another power failure.
Our City of Cape Town local government have been very busy trying to offend even more of it’s citizens.
Not so long ago, the courts had to order the city to once again erect community toilets in Khayelitsha which mayor Dan Plato had removed just before the Soccer World Cup last year.
(Some Khayelitsha residents wanted concrete structures, protested and removed the corrugated iron ones around the toilets.)
The toilets were then completely removed by the city, because the world media’s eyes would be on us, the mayor declared at a news conference. Wearing a Bafana Bafana jersey, mind you.
To follow that up, the city fathers (and mothers, I suppose) voted to have a new liquor by-law enacted.
No liquor to be sold or served after by establishments after 11pm in residential areas and 2.00am in business areas.
They made this joyous announcement the Tuesday before New Year’s eve. To be strictly enforced on New Year’s eve, the councillor in charge of these matters, declared.
Of course they had to backtrack because a UCT Masters student reminded the city that the by-law had not yet been gazetted. And could only do so on 14 January 2011.
Backed into a corner, the city have now put out a more toned down statement about “educating” business owners about the by-law and phasing it in over a few months.
Just so no one else feel left out…
The City of Cape Town have in their wisdom (naturally) decided that the annual Coon Carnival had to take place either on New Year’s day or the Saturday after.
Since the 2nd fell on a Sunday this year (a religious day even for slaves), the Coons wanted to march on 3 January.
For those uneducated 
in these matters, the Coon Carnival was celebrated by Cape slaves on 2 January as a protest against their masters.
Not 1 January. Nor 8 January.
Apparently the city had arranged with a rebel group of Coons to march through the city centre on 1 January.
The ‘official’ group arranged a protest march through to the Premier’s Wale Street today.
Much like slaves did a century or so ago, one would imagine.
But the City of Cape Town probably won’t even get the irony.
So today I wrote my first exam for the year. I’m not sure how it went – okay I guess.
To get my head cleared, I took an hour walk. It turned out to be such a beautiful evening. One of those evening walks that feels perfect when everything feels right with the world. Even though I’m not sure that I’m going to pass the exam I took today and my next exam is a few hours away.
And I have to go to the office on Wednesday.
I came over the bridge close to my home and there was Table Mountain. Everything else fell away.
It’s been a while since I took the time to enjoy one of those moments that make us Capetonians so annoying to those who don’t have a mountain in the middle of their city.
This morning we woke up to some cloud and a measure of cooler weather – compared to the last few scorchers!
I absolutely love summer and I love hot sunny days, but yesterday was beyond bearable, even for me. Fortunately we were in doors most of the time, with airconditioning.
My flat is felt cool when I got home from work. Much cooler than outside anyway, because I’ve been opening the windows and doors early in the morning and closing up before the sun rises.
Since there’s no one at home during the day, when I get home, everything is nice and cool.
That is until sunset! Arggghhh, then it just feels humid and hot, especially with the computer generating it’s own heat!
It looks like we might get a bit of rain today though it’s still very humid.
I’m almost looking forward to winter. Almost.
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