Too Late?

This might be the first post people have seen in a long time. If all goes well, I would have fixed the problem with the index page and people would be able to navigate here, as opposed to have telepathically know which address would have brought them here directly.

Two, three, maybe more weeks. That's how late this post is. No, it's not a summary of going ons (it's been work, mostly :-P ). Rather, it's been a topic that has been affecting may people severely. A few weeks ago, the Cape started suffering from massive power-outages as repair began/continued/whatever on our only nuclear power plant. You might have heard about it, along with lavishly romantic stories about Al-Qaeda sabotage etc. Fact is some poor dolt left a bolt in there after repairs at the end of last year and since then its just not been purring like it use to. The power company went on a massive search to find "a new part". The problem is that there aren't that many nuclear power plant spare parts out there, and those that are are kept closely by their owners for in case some poor dolt leaves a bolt in one of the reactors after maintenance work... My cousin had suggested they try Ebay, but I thought they should have just picked up the latest copy of the Hacker's Black Book. Well, whatever they did, in the end, they found a new part, replaced it and now things seem to be better. Now, there hasn't been a whole lot of concrete news and hard facts that came the public's way; most are wild rumours and heresy. But a little birdie whispered that on the ninth, today, the fixed reactor's license expires and it is required to shut down for inspection before a new one is issued. Long story, blah blah blah. Not many hard facts, except for one: the whole black-out story isn't over yet by a long shot.

Meanwhile Joe Public has been suffering, living by candle and (if you were lucky enough to get some) gas light. Many people have bought home generators and yes, I did foresee the demand and would have made a KILLING if I had the capital to invest in generators five months ago. Joe Economy is suffering with the loss of "billions", but that is far removed from me. I just get angry when the power goes off when my PC is still on, because that is going to screw it up one day. I've considered buying a UPS, but even if I can find one, I don't really have the money to spend. Of course, not even the mighty University of Stellenbosch is immune: when the blackouts were at their worst, I had a very chill course, because I can do basically no practical work (though not even a blackout can stop the Department of Applied Mathematics, tun-tun-duh!).
If blame was tangible, the whole Cape would have been covered in brown and smelly goo. Most people blame the power company. The ruling political party blamed the opposition of sabotage the day before the local municipal elections and I read today a columnist blaming hippies, right wing boers and terrorists, respectively (thankfully he at least was joking). I don't blame so much in this case. Maybe the tree huggers (a little) for hampering the building of new nuclear power plants, but I guess we were probably destined for this anyway. I also don't feel bad or self-pity because our little third world country is struggling so with electricity: I happen to know of the blackouts in New York and Italy just a few years ago. And there were some in Britain and Scandinavia as well, or so I hear. So, maybe this is just our right of passage. Rather have the infrastructure collapse now so it can all be rebuilt, fresh and shiny for 2010.

It's not like I'm not use to blackouts. They're not uncommon, but I have a few memories of having to do without electricity. It really is a unique experience. Here at Stellenbosch things are a little different. When the electricity goes out, some people use it as a reason to have a party. And, of course, when the power comes back on, you need to celebrate it...

If you live in a posh first world country and have never really had a blackout, I think you've kind of missed out. I don't know why, but I do. And it's not like you can simulate it: you can't turn off the mains or anything like that, because you need to know you are completely out of control. The world changes when there isn't two dozen electrical appliances beeping and humming all throughout the house. It becomes empty and very quiet.