Make a plan

Eskom and the power cuts are still the MAIN topic of discussion in South Africa, all over the place. Someone here turned up late to work yesterday and was told by the boss to "just blame a blackout - everyone else does!" :-)

Listening to talk radio on the commute, it struck me again what a resourceful bunch we as South Africans are. Or perhaps just Africans in general?

Yes, we're all moaning and complaining at the Eskom stuff-ups. There's plenty of blame being thrown around like so much crud, but in the face of it the resourceful spirit of us Africans is coming to the fore. Conversations are switching from "I can't function!" to " Stuff the authorities - what can I do about this myself?". Solar and wind power are big on the conversational agenda, the merits of inverters and batteries are discussed in-depth, and some guys are coming up with fascinating solutions to either decrease their power consumption or go independent of Eskom.

I like it. I like how we as a nation (or a continent) can take a problem and turn it into an innovation. How we come up with unique solutions for every-man, ones that work in our environment, for our cultures, for our requirements - and sometimes for the entire planet.

So yes, Eskom is being highly irritating and costing the country in ways we probably haven't even realized.

But I suspect this is just one massive opportunity for the entrepreneurial spirits, the clever minds, the find-the-gap thinkers to shine. Who knows - out of this crisis could come something totally amazing, something world-changing.