The first thing you thought of was a cave right? We all live in eMalahleni so maybe everyone first thought of their own homes.
Sometimes I just feel like ranting at all the injustice in this world and especially what a crime service delivery has become like a fisherman complaining about too much ocean. But apparently I have to consider common sense, and challenging opinions and all that. Ha! Common sense, here? Indeed dear reader you see it is cleverly hidden under a layer or two of nonsense. Now back to the topic of cold, dark places.
As I was sitting in my kitchen being cold and dark of course while heating up a pot of water over a gas burner in the middle of the floor a thought occurred to me. One we have all thought. What did people do without electricity? It turns out that question is not as silly as it seems.
Imagine living in Rome 1 500 years ago; the height of civilization and technology. Imagine sitting down for dinner staring out on the majestic city-scape and hearing the crushing of bones at the Friday night coliseum event. But lo! Your Kenwood microwave is unable to warm the leftovers from last night’s wild boar because electricity will not be harnessed for another 1 300 years or so. Guess what? They had their lights on, they kept their houses warm, and cooked their food and all kinds of fun things like that, that requires energy. Energy from burning oil, the sun, wood, and many other creative science stuff. Humans are surprisingly squishy. We don’t do well in the wild.
So cutting our electricity and saying things like, “well they lived without it fine so we don’t really need it now,” is ridiculous. We have just replaced one from of energy for another. It has become vital to day live and even critically vital in the case of hospital machinery to name but one example.
The next time you sit hopelessly in your dark, cold excuse for a bedroom during a power outage and as you feel your tows physically turning into mango flavoured lollies just remember that they did not have it worse in the old days and you have a right to be angry for not receiving a service that you are paying for.
Although it is kind of nice not having to worry about the black plague. What can you do about it? Consider getting a reliable generator or building a solar powered time machine to wisp you away to simpler days, 1939 perhaps?
