So if Jay Leno did a show in South Africa, the butt of every joke right now would be load shedding (in American terms: rolling blackouts). Currently there is a lack of power to supply electricity to everyone in SA because the power plants just aren't big enough to keep up with the population/industry growth here. So the government has decided instead of investing in building bigger and better power plants, they'd rather have the 2010 World Cup Soccer in South Africa....which of course means the money must be spent on building airports, and widening roads, and building stadiums in preparation for the world to descend on us in 2010 instead of supplying electricity to its country. In each suburb, power is cut for 2 hours a day, and you just have to deal with it. This is effecting, well, everything. To make matters worse, they never stick to the schedule, so the power is cut for longer and can actually be at any time. AND they reckon that the problem won't be solved until AFTER 2010 when they can actually invest in building power plants. So...this means our power will be cut 2 hours a day until about 2013. Think of how this affects the country. Its crazy really. No business can complete a full days work, (imagine being at work and having to take a 2 hour break cause you can't even check your email) no restaurant knows if they can stay open all night or not, grocery stores can't keep their meats etc. cold, surgeries can't be scheduled in case generators conk out. etc. etc. We've been rather lucky living on a "hospital grid" which means ours isn't cut as much, but we are moving to a very small community, which means we will be hit pretty hard by this when we move in a few months time. Everytime someone here asks me what America is like in comparison to where I live, I usually answer "its just like here, only everything is bigger there (cars, grocerystores, its just BIG in America) but now I actually feel like I'm living in a foreign country where the governments crazy decisions actually effect us personally. BUT if you think about it from an eternal perspective, living without electricity doesn't really matter, when the power is cut my relationship with God isn't effected :) Its just a little inconvenient. So we are trying to "rejoice always"...even in the dark :)
1 comment:
I appreciated your reflections on the electricity situation there. At least it's not cold like Montana is now; people would freeze to death without electricity.
Hey, Andy suggested you get a generator at your new place. You've probably already thought of that. In his research, Honda generators are top-of-the-line.
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