Patience is a virtue.
Patience is definately being tested of late by living in South Africa. A common expression used by the expats when annoyed by an occurence specific to South Africa is TIA (acronym for This Is Africa)... it has now been changed to TIFA!
Currently, demand for electricity is outweighing supply. In addition to this, maintenance is performed over the Summer period. These factors combined with some unexpected outages has resulted in a 25% reduction in supply. Hence, the requirement for load shedding. Load shedding is when Eskom (electricity provider) cuts electricity supply in suburbs on a rotational basis around Gauteng for a few hours.
Yesterday Jen's patience was definately tested.
- No electricity from 7am to 10.30am at home in Lone Hill.
- At 4.30pm Jen left home for the short drive to the gym. There was load shedding in suburbs on the route to the gym, therefore traffic lights were not operating during peak hour. Whilst the Outsurance pointsmen (refer to earlier post about 'traffic in Joburg') did their best to assist with traffic flow, the normally 15min drive took 1hr.
- Subsequently discovered there was no electricity in Woodmead at the gym, therefore half the equipment did not work and there was no music. The spin class was undertaken with no music and no instructor (he was stuck in traffic!).
- Got home to Lone Hill and found that there was no electricity at home (from 6.30pm to 8pm). Dabbo, a friend, invited us over for dinner- he did have power.
- When we arrived at Dabbo's house, load shedding subsequently occurred in his suburb.
You can't win! Unfortunately they won't tell you where or when the load shedding will occur. The CEO of Eskom today announced that they hope to have improved the shortage by the end of the week; however it looks like an ongoing problem until 2012...
Luckily our house is furnished with large candelabras, and we have invested in a gas camping light!
Patience is definately being tested of late by living in South Africa. A common expression used by the expats when annoyed by an occurence specific to South Africa is TIA (acronym for This Is Africa)... it has now been changed to TIFA!
Currently, demand for electricity is outweighing supply. In addition to this, maintenance is performed over the Summer period. These factors combined with some unexpected outages has resulted in a 25% reduction in supply. Hence, the requirement for load shedding. Load shedding is when Eskom (electricity provider) cuts electricity supply in suburbs on a rotational basis around Gauteng for a few hours.
Yesterday Jen's patience was definately tested.
- No electricity from 7am to 10.30am at home in Lone Hill.
- At 4.30pm Jen left home for the short drive to the gym. There was load shedding in suburbs on the route to the gym, therefore traffic lights were not operating during peak hour. Whilst the Outsurance pointsmen (refer to earlier post about 'traffic in Joburg') did their best to assist with traffic flow, the normally 15min drive took 1hr.
- Subsequently discovered there was no electricity in Woodmead at the gym, therefore half the equipment did not work and there was no music. The spin class was undertaken with no music and no instructor (he was stuck in traffic!).
- Got home to Lone Hill and found that there was no electricity at home (from 6.30pm to 8pm). Dabbo, a friend, invited us over for dinner- he did have power.
- When we arrived at Dabbo's house, load shedding subsequently occurred in his suburb.
You can't win! Unfortunately they won't tell you where or when the load shedding will occur. The CEO of Eskom today announced that they hope to have improved the shortage by the end of the week; however it looks like an ongoing problem until 2012...
Luckily our house is furnished with large candelabras, and we have invested in a gas camping light!