Change Within

So following on from such a sad piece... let me up my tempo!

While last Wednesday had me trummeling out sad scenarios, by Thursday night I had a good bottle of wine in my system and curry to wash it down with, and we were talking to a Civil Engineer friend who is heartly involved in making concrete change to our lively province.

Good things are happening in Jozi!

And it is going to be sad to miss. Come five years time & my arrival home... Rosebank & surrounds is going have a very different look & vibe. Hopefully and knowingly, it will be even more cosmo & upbeat than the fun air it already lauds.

- I am going to miss the World Cup and plus four weeks of CHAOTIC karnival fun that will be around the city & country. And there are a handful of Scandinavians who want to take me out now that THE couch is up & leaving just a few months before all football hell breaks loose. I’m just hoping the Confederation Cup will compare.

- I am going to miss getting into the REA VAYA habit of things. As much of a bitch as it is now (don’t take my Oxford lanes away!), it should be shweeeet in a year or so’s time. Just pop on & up Rivonia Road you’ll go – no petrol or traffic jams of your own to manoeuvre.

- Rosebank is going high rise – from living to working. And yes, they are trying to demolish my most gorgeous ex-apartment. But otherwise, it should put in some city living & renovate a world that could use a twist of paint. Another nook of Jozi to celebrate!

- The Gautrain is going to be old news by the time I step on it to ride from Oli Tambo to home. You guys will have your “oyster style” cards and now what works when and how and where. I won’t have the first clue.

- I’ll miss 5 years of whatever the next presidential party involves. Step off the Gautrain just in time to vote for the following regime. Here’s praying & karma’ing & sacrificing all I can in the hope that this next 5 years involves such positive developments... that I will even have missed the start of the clean up of crime & selfishness & violent backhanded actions & mistreatment of the nation’s children.

When you’re in it, you usually do not see what change is going on around you. The roads quietly deteriorate & suddenly the whole country is calmly & habitually swerving potholes. One day, the Hyatt was the tallest building in Rosebank, this morning its competitor got a little higher. One day, you were swerving potholes to work... the next you were buying your monthly bus card for Rea Vaya.

Yes, the change could go either way. But sometimes when you realise you will be out of it, the change looks all bitter sweet and positive.

Enjoy it for me!