Independance Weekend
1 Comments Published by Oh Wayward One on 03 October 2007 at 10/03/2007 11:58:00 am.
wow. it was a crazy 4 days hiatus.
friday night we had a blast with David in what started out as sundowners and ended up as a magnificent Indian food feast. Dave is a contractor of ours who we work with but never really meet, b/c he lives in Namibia. Oddly enough he, too, is American and has been living/working in Africa for over 20 years. Love that guy. Couldn't find another like-minded dude on this whole continent. And can hold his own with the red wine, that's for sure. Best indian food in town too, can't beat that.
Anyway saturday morning it was up at the butt-ass-crack of dawn to drive 2 hours south and meet the guys (Jéan & Alan) for the big hiking trip in the Magaliesburg mountains. I've got amazing photos of this... maybe saving those for the OTHER blog as all the old folks at home like to see pretty pictures. We hiked miles and miles and miles along an amazing canyon that rivals everything I've ever hiked before. The boys were in good spirits, we only got lost/off trail once, and just before dusk when we were nearing camp we ran into a big trip of well-mannered baboons who let us sit down and just watch them in peace as they... well, watched us... for like 30 minutes. Sundowners by the fire, huge feast of lamb and wors, and klippies+coke to round off the day. Couldn't have been nicer. Exhausted.
Sunday it was more hiking, but only a half a day since the boys had to be back in Joburg for work on Monday. But the Mr. and I had 2 MORE DAYS OFF to look forward to!!! God I love BW public holidays when they give you 2 in a row!!! So it was back to Gabz-city for us. :-( I always love being in SA, and I love hanging out with my buddies. The drive back always makes me a wee bit heartsore but hell we had 2 more days off to look forward to!!!
So Exhausted and in physical pain, we arrived back in G-town, and didn't do much that night except for take showers and collapse. It would've been a lovely sleep-in day on Monday except........
.......the cable thieves finally took it upon themselves to hit us. It was our turn. Nearly everyone in our neighbourhood has had their cables stolen over the last year, except for us. Not sure why they left us out and hadn't given us the honor yet, but Monday night they sure made up for it. What they do here is they hook up a bakkie (truck) to your cable out at the meter, sneak up to your house and cut it at the end, and start driving. Pulling out metre after metre of your cable. Then they sell it to the scrap yard because copper is in HUGE demand and they pay big time for it. So there's us, waking up at 6am on our day off, to Mary going "the thieves! They took the electricity! We have no power or water!" And when, prey tell, would be the absolute WORST time all year to have this happen? Why on a public holiday twofer, of COURSE! How the hell does one get out an electrician on Independence Day hols???
Luckily we have some connections, and were able to sort the main power source out to OUR house, but poor Mary's couldn't get fixed. Plus the booster pump that gets us our water from the borehole couldn't be fixed til today. So as of today, we've been without water for 3 days, and electricity for 2. Hopefully that shit will be sorted out by the time we get home today. Damn thieves. The worst part is that they're cheeky.... they know it's something you're going to get fixed IMMEDIATELY, so they wait til it gets fixed and then they rock up a week later and take your new stuff! Bastards!!! We're getting the electrician to dig this stuff down super, super deep, but that doesn't necessarily stop them when they have the strength of a truck pulling the cables out. Oh well, such is life in Botswana.
But seriously, having no water SUCKS. Thank god for the swimming pool. Thank god that it didn't happen to the neighbours so we can go over with 10-gallon jugs and fill them up with clean water. The electricity is a bitch too. For a few hours, it's one thing. But for DAYS it's another.
friday night we had a blast with David in what started out as sundowners and ended up as a magnificent Indian food feast. Dave is a contractor of ours who we work with but never really meet, b/c he lives in Namibia. Oddly enough he, too, is American and has been living/working in Africa for over 20 years. Love that guy. Couldn't find another like-minded dude on this whole continent. And can hold his own with the red wine, that's for sure. Best indian food in town too, can't beat that.
Anyway saturday morning it was up at the butt-ass-crack of dawn to drive 2 hours south and meet the guys (Jéan & Alan) for the big hiking trip in the Magaliesburg mountains. I've got amazing photos of this... maybe saving those for the OTHER blog as all the old folks at home like to see pretty pictures. We hiked miles and miles and miles along an amazing canyon that rivals everything I've ever hiked before. The boys were in good spirits, we only got lost/off trail once, and just before dusk when we were nearing camp we ran into a big trip of well-mannered baboons who let us sit down and just watch them in peace as they... well, watched us... for like 30 minutes. Sundowners by the fire, huge feast of lamb and wors, and klippies+coke to round off the day. Couldn't have been nicer. Exhausted.
Sunday it was more hiking, but only a half a day since the boys had to be back in Joburg for work on Monday. But the Mr. and I had 2 MORE DAYS OFF to look forward to!!! God I love BW public holidays when they give you 2 in a row!!! So it was back to Gabz-city for us. :-( I always love being in SA, and I love hanging out with my buddies. The drive back always makes me a wee bit heartsore but hell we had 2 more days off to look forward to!!!
So Exhausted and in physical pain, we arrived back in G-town, and didn't do much that night except for take showers and collapse. It would've been a lovely sleep-in day on Monday except........
.......the cable thieves finally took it upon themselves to hit us. It was our turn. Nearly everyone in our neighbourhood has had their cables stolen over the last year, except for us. Not sure why they left us out and hadn't given us the honor yet, but Monday night they sure made up for it. What they do here is they hook up a bakkie (truck) to your cable out at the meter, sneak up to your house and cut it at the end, and start driving. Pulling out metre after metre of your cable. Then they sell it to the scrap yard because copper is in HUGE demand and they pay big time for it. So there's us, waking up at 6am on our day off, to Mary going "the thieves! They took the electricity! We have no power or water!" And when, prey tell, would be the absolute WORST time all year to have this happen? Why on a public holiday twofer, of COURSE! How the hell does one get out an electrician on Independence Day hols???
Luckily we have some connections, and were able to sort the main power source out to OUR house, but poor Mary's couldn't get fixed. Plus the booster pump that gets us our water from the borehole couldn't be fixed til today. So as of today, we've been without water for 3 days, and electricity for 2. Hopefully that shit will be sorted out by the time we get home today. Damn thieves. The worst part is that they're cheeky.... they know it's something you're going to get fixed IMMEDIATELY, so they wait til it gets fixed and then they rock up a week later and take your new stuff! Bastards!!! We're getting the electrician to dig this stuff down super, super deep, but that doesn't necessarily stop them when they have the strength of a truck pulling the cables out. Oh well, such is life in Botswana.
But seriously, having no water SUCKS. Thank god for the swimming pool. Thank god that it didn't happen to the neighbours so we can go over with 10-gallon jugs and fill them up with clean water. The electricity is a bitch too. For a few hours, it's one thing. But for DAYS it's another.
You know... you sure have been a victim of crime pretty frequently since you've moved to BW. What is the deal?!?! I can appreciate all the wonderful things BW has to offer but this crime thing seems pretty fucking out of hand.
Keep your eyeballs clicking, I guess.