I was fortunate recently to be standing in line with several hundred others waiting for a new bulk shopping centre to open in Pretoria. The opening had been marketed well with newspaper adverts detailing massive specials and road-signs from close to the city centre pointing the way many kilometers out to the east. I was there to buy a luxury goods item, a satellite decoder.My compatriots were competing for the same item and we joked about how far we were from the entrance, the amount of stock involved and would we be able to lay our hands on the prized item. In the half hour that I stood there the queue snaked back onto itself almost six times.
Besides the bonding so early in the morning, my thoughts drifted to old images of people queuing for far more basic necessities, such as bread or milk or fuel. The images that flit through my mind was of the old Eastern European countries and the stories we heard of the lack of basic goods. Is this a relic of history, the present reality or a foreboding future?
Coming closer to home the absence of basic goods is felt across the continent. In the last decade I've seen 7-hour fuel queues in one of the most oil-rich country on the continent. Today we hear of more recent queues even closer to home where even just getting a passport is as important as getting fuel or loaf of bread. Bribing the right people becomes an option many would rather not confront. Queuing for luxury goods in the early hours of the morning seems a far cry from queuing for basic groceries to feed your family.
David Lipton, reviewing economic shifts in Eastern Europe, wrote:
"One Russian pundit, commenting on the communist legacy, explained that anyone can turn an aquarium into fish stew, but it is much harder to turn fish stew into an aquarium."I was standing in line in order to get a massive saving off this decoder, while others were paying far more dearly for a basic loaf of bread. Without basic services such as electricity my decoder will not even function. We have recently been suffering from load shedding in South Africa. Power cuts have caused great consternation amongst businesses and citizens. Everyone laments the inconvenience and thanks their gods that they don't live in another country. "Thank God we had enough power to watch the Rugby World Cup" was often heard over the last heady weekend. At least this load shedding can be classified as an inconvenience rather than a way of life (at present).
While we are moving into the 21st century at a rapid pace, we are also still sitting with massive poverty and an accompanying flare-up in corruption around the world. I enjoy the luxuries of new technology, but I wonder how we are going to provide everyone with consistent lights, clean water, sufficient food and adequate safety. How can we be putting all the benefits we enjoy of this new century to good use to benefit more people? How are we/am I making a difference? Is there an aquarium or fish stew in the future? Am I building a wall between me and my neighbour so I can keep my aquarium safe? Will I be queing for fish stew within the next few decades?
