Dark Reign

South Africa is within the grip of another barrage of “controlled” power-outages. The recent woes started a little less than two weeks ago when four generators in Mpumalanga failed simultaneously. Since then, we have suffered numerous power failures here in Stellenbosch. Some of these failures I took personally, as they happened just as I sat down in front of my computer to relax a bit. At least books don't run on electricity. The other power failures I experienced were less interruptive, but just as annoying, as they happened at my respective places of work. Everyone learned long ago that you can't trust Eskom for a continuous supply of electricity, so the places of work which can afford to do so has acquired diesel generators. This includes my place of employment and the University of Stellenbosch. Computers and lights are run off the generators, but of course air conditioning is a pure luxury, so that has to be turned off. In Stellenbosch, in the middle of summer, in rooms where multiple people and running computers are congregated, it is not ideal to be without air conditioning. But, we push forward; within one or two (or four) hours, the loud drone of the diesel engines will stop as another city or area is plunged in (metaphorical and literal) darkness.

For the past five working days, I have been under the employment of the University of Stellenbosch again. This time it was as a student assistant for the Computer Science bridging course for the first-years-to-be. After the first, relatively quiet day, I was hopeful and eager to play a part in the shaping of these virgin minds fresh out of a failing school system. By Friday, however, things had turned dire. I don't know whether it was the heat or the disheartening revelation that most of the students were fledgling engineering students or both, but I found my patience wearing thin, especially with the second (and largest) group. The reality was that these poor souls were accepted by our Engineering faculty and commanded to have Computer Science as a subject somewhere along their academic journey. However, the hopeful civil and chemical engineers (probably ignorant to the true scope of their chosen study course), have little or no experience of computer programming. It was encouraging to see some of the students pick up on programming almost immediately, but with others it was an uphill battle to explain even the most basic concepts. By the end of this experience, my confidence as a computer science pedagogue had taken a severe beating. However, the money was good. Perhaps I shall try my hand as a student assistant in the second semester again.

Continuing my busy-bee streak, I landed yet another part-time job. This time it is the System Administrator of the Computer Science division at the University of Stellenbosch. Our current system administrator is leaving at the end of the month (to go be a “house husband”, in his words, in another part of the country) and we had been unable to find a replace, due in no small part to the fact that the pay is not very good. I am assured, however, that at this point most of the administrative tasks have been automated with scripts, so I won't be working myself to death, but the salary is not enough for someone to try and make a living from working there. So, due to some academic politics I am not going to go into now, I had been offered the job, and I accepted. I am still planning on studying full time, however, so my duties will be clearly defined and constrained. For the time being, am I also only employed as system admin until April, which suits me fine. The truth is that I shall be earning more as system admin than I am currently earning at my other job.

If this isn't going to be the year of the nervous breakdown or the collapse from exhaustion, it might just be a good one. I am weary of making predictions, but at the moment I have just enough challenges and opportunities in front of me to keep me on my toes, but to also keep me excited. Last week I had another meeting with my promoter for my masters again, and stuff we discussed regarding my masters really got me excited again. I only need to close this regular expressions chapter of my life first...

Saturday was my birthday. I had a quiet day with my folks and in the evening some of my friends and I went to Paulaners in the V&A Waterfront. Thanks to everyone wished me well, who joined me at Paulaners and everyone who tried to come, but couldn't make it. Sunday was more family day as my brother and his wife treated me to a Watershed concert at Kirstenbosch. I had never been to one of their concerts and had expressed my desire to attend one before. I had also introduced my brother and his wife to Watershed on a previous visit, so we were all keen to go. It was a thoroughly awesome experience! The band was great, the music was great and the venue was great. Kudos to Kirstenbosch Summer Concerts!