Communication Collapse

Living in Cape Town, one would have very little reason for falling out of touch with a friend. Most people have their own car, and most people live really close to their friends. Everyone has landline telephones in their homes, cell phone credit is cheap and there is always a network of friends to communicate through if none of the above is available, i.e. if you live in the bush.

London doesn’t, at least not for me. As great as my new house may be, there is unfortunately no land line, my cell phone credit gets stolen from dodgy ring tone companies that steal credit without permission (this has now been stopped at the cost of a prime-time telephone call) and signal/reception is mostly crap.

Although I have friends (no, I’m not a sad lonely person) there is no network, but more of an adventitious root type relationship with them i.e. they’re not all connected and I see them on separate occasions, through no fault of my own, it just works out that way.

Tube rides take a minimum of 35 minutes for me to get into central London, signal failures and people lying on the tracks aside. Add another 30 minutes and you’ve got the time it takes to see my semi-fictitious ‘incestuous’ family as Chris puts it.

When pissups and ‘other’ plans don’t block you from seeing friends, a self pitying feeling of being homesick surrounds you and you turn down potential ‘good times’.

For a 1st world country and one of the most cosmopolitan, urban and happening cities in the world, communication surely sucks.

Maybe that just comes with the territory or maybe its just me not being able plan properly, calling up 30 minutes before you want to go for a pissup in Cape Town is normal, in London its not.

Hopefully sometime this week myself, Chris, Dayne and m-a-r-c-i-a, (did I spell it right) can get pissed somewhere.

(Before you start judging me for referring to being pissed alot, I haven’t been sufficiently pissed in a good couple of weeks now)