Different Day

What a weird day. Got up at 5am for a cycle, then tried to sleep again because I was so tired, then couldn't sleep. Then called the director to say I'm going to get my VISA today, and he was like, "Can't you go next week?" And I thought, "What difference does it make? In fact, wouldn't it better if I went now while Christian is like...an extra teacher." I think things were slowly starting to click.

Will take my computer in to the PC Doctor tomorrow, soon, hopefully, there'll be no trojan horsing around, and it will be digitalness as usual. Odd thing: Jane called the guy and asked him about whether my data will be safe, and he volunteered to fetch the PC from my place. I clicked a little later that the last time he did that Fransa was still here. I'll bet he thinks she's still here. Well, wish she was.

Lots seems to be happening. Here, there, everywhere. Makes me dizzy. A friend of mine is going down to Bloem to do a guitar gig. My dad is apparently running around Langenhoven Park with Fransa's sister in law, looking at a potential house for me. Jenny is back in Cape Town. Ane is in Saudi Arabia. Fransa's training with Zet. And it's her birthday tomorrow.
I had an unexpected knock on the door at 10:30pm or something, as I was about to start CD2 of War of the Worlds (incredible flick, don't miss it). Corneli happened to be in the building and wanted to invite me to someone's farewell. Hardly know her, and haven't seen her once in this building.
"Hi. I'm Nick."
"I don't even know who you are. And by the way, it's too hot in here. Lose the hat."
"Ok, well, bye."

I went to Newcore for the first time today. It's got a lovely grocery store, so many colorful aisles you can get lost in them. I did get lost looking for spaghetti. I ended up buying smoked salmon from Norway, and some prawns that sprouted out of the plastic bag as I took them out the basket. Imagine a hundred frozen prawns covering your wine, new toothbrush, green peppers and... Whoah. Having a vocabulary shock here. What's the word for that green leafy stuff that isn't lettuce. Give me a minute. Oh yes, cabbage. Spend enough time not talking English and you can't remember basic words from your own language.

Ordered two pieces of pizza afterwards, a waste of money and a blasphemy against my diet plan, but I didn't see myself cooking tonight, and I was just bum tired. I think Carrefour is cheaper, a little cheaper than Newcore, but if I need some bacon, or some spaghetti or something, I'd rather go across the street. The other thing is Carrefour is a long way to lug. Think I'll go to C4 only when I am in the area and on my way back.

Remember I said shopping without a list is better? Well, a lot worse is shopping in a new supermarket. You spend a lot more time figuring out where you are, and passing a lot of interesting goodies. I saw some big fish swimming in the tanks. It occurred to me that they are living a silent horror movie right there, in the sublime halls where we stroll about for our food, classical music stroking our ears. Do you think they don't see the carcasses of their kind lying gutted and on ice. There eyes see that, and us, and they are just to tired, and exhausted, and weird-ed out to know what to do. One that I looked at had banged his snout into something blunt and bleeding. Maybe we can't hear them, but they are not going gently into the night. Even if you tap the tank gently as I did, and telepathise: think happy thoughts guys. For soon you will be dead.

In War of the Worlds, Spielberg has made a very realistic, very watchable movie. Very well done. Initially I thought the beginning was very cheesy, but it was just a slow and gentle start. It was unexpectedly gut wrenching, and Spielberg's attention to detail, powerful. He has some classic shots. The most amazing thing is he puts spectacular stuff in front of you, and it feels fully real. One of his most beautiful shots, the one I remember most vividly is a bunch of people in the foreground, their silhouettes blackened agianst the wet streets, with the white spire of a church looming above them. Not long after that, the spire comes crashing down.

There's a scene where Tom Cruise is in a car, and since none of the cars work, the car gets stuck in a throng of people. He gets yanked from the car, and soon people are killing each other for the car.
It's scary what we, as the human race, are capable of, when things aren't going quite as we'd like them to.
Christian and I had a conversation along those lines. Of chaos and anarchy. Kindergarten kids are no different in their behaviour than adults were a few hundred years ago. Running around, guided by whatever impulse. Civilisation is basically the things that order our behaviour. The things that work to order our behaviour. Not much order in those days, and not much was achieved by the ordinary mortals. Whatever you may say, today more individuals than ever have wealth and power, we are ordered by our education, religion, the economics that we live by (Capitalism). Possibly our behaviour is guided for the most part by a common pursuit for money. So we all understand each other, we can all drive dangerous machines on the same highway despite our lack of concentration, because we're all terrified of denting or scratching our cars and we know the person next to us knows that too. We even pursue a mate based pretty much on how much they can give us, or someone who is pretty much either on the same level or used to a similar level of sophistication/class/economic wellbeing as we are.

I sometimes get the feeling how close the masses of people are to anarchy. If there are no more jobs, what guides our behaviour? That's evident in South Africa. An economy in a long term malaise is bad news for the haves. If everyone gets sent home on the same day, what will people begin to do for themselves, and to each other. Peak Oil, at a critical point, will obviously choke the world economy. People will not have too much time to go home. They'll have to go out into the fields. If you're used to groceries, and TV, and the internet, who is going to stand up and go out and be a farmer? Maybe there'll be a lot of people hungry walking through the streets and shouting. Maybe that will be it for a few years.

Enough doom and gloom.
Today has been rainy, but at least this will be the first decent sleep I've had in about a month. When I wake up, everything until now may seem like it was a dream. Maybe it is a dream.