There are things afoot at the Circle K

Things have changed in South Africa since I was here last. Obviously Apartheid is gone, but I was curious as to how things would be different. What's most noticeable are the things that I didn't appreciate as unusual when I was here last. TV for instance, in 1989 it was just normal TV as far as I was concerned, pretty unremarkable, but now on SABC1 (BBC1 equivalent) most of the programming is in Xhosa rather than English or Afrikaans and nearly all the presenters are coloured, Indian or black now. The head of South African Airways is a black man. In restaurants the non white people are no longer confined to the kitchen. They are serving, welcoming and most remarkably, eating. All sorts of people are out on the streets. With this new racial tolerance comes other kinds of tolerance. There are now openly gay bars and clubs, whereas before it was something spoken about in hushed tones.

Today the weather has again been spectacular. A little cooler than yesterday with a few little fluffy clouds, but the best bit is the 'tablecloth' of cloud on top of Table Mountain. It's not static either, it continually rolls off the edge and dissipates as it slides down the front of the mountain. I set my alarm for 8 this morning; me? Setting my alarm for 8am when I have nothing planned? What is the world coming to? It's not that I'm so excited to be here I'm like a child on Christmas morning, more that I knew I'd castigate myself if I slept in late. So I put on the radio (on my phone - woo hoo!) and showered & shaved. My foot is getting much better, so I might even be able to do a little walking by the weekend, but I won't push it. I got back to the Tourist Information place too late last night, so I couldn't pick up my crutches which I'd swapped for a wheelchair earlier and I therefore had to go back to the Waterfront today to pick them up: it's a hard life. Obviously I didn't get them straight away, but got another wheelchair and rolled about round the shops for most of the day. It's odd being in a wheelchair. The lazy bastard in me loves that I can get around without getting off my fat arse, and going down slopes is pretty cool. I also like that my upper body gets a little exercise. There are drawbacks though. All those slopes in place of steps are useful, but it's still hard work getting up them and some are so steep! Additionally people tend not to hear you coming or see you out of the corner of their eye, and this, combined with an inability to squeeze past people means that I have to keep asking people to get out of the fucking way. Politely of course. Those who have driven with me on a motorway will have experienced similar. On the whole though people are really friendly and helpful, happy to help me up steep slopes, especially seeing as the wheelchair I had today had completely bare tyres. I never realised that wheelchairs have so much character, just like cars and bikes or, in the case of the one I had yesterday, shopping trolleys. Bloody thing kept veering to the left, which meant I had to push more with my left arm, which is of course the weaker one.

I called a friend (Simon) from my last visit this morning and left a message for him, but he has yet to call back. Guess I'll be hanging out in the bars near my crash pad tonight then. The city beckons...