Mission Impossible 4

Sunrise once and coffee once again. I do not get tired of sitting in the chair facing the sunrise with my cup of coffee and watching the light and the sky change by the minute.  Ingrid drove off to her Friday morning Pilates lesson and Mom and I sat at home. Actually Mom lay in bed and I sat and did a bit of the puzzle. and put the kettle through it's paces.

Ingrid sent a message that she would stay on after class and drink coffee with one of her classmates. I guess a few more puzzle pieces found their place. Ingrid came in the door all energised and one would have to be blind not to have seen that in he demeanour. She was bubbling over. Her 'date' had gone well. Nice to see. Slowly we are getting to know more and more people and it is seemingly exponential. We are bumping into people who either nod or wave. 

I had already finished off the left overs from last nights supper and Ingrid had some yoghurt with granola. Mom went all in with her butter on toast. Ingrid took to the shower and we arbed for a while. The birds (free examples) got fed with bird seed and every now and again we had a few birdy visitors. Mom saw a monkey over the road on the rooftop and Ingrid grabbed the binoculars to take a closer look. They are cute, but pesky and brutal thieves. Nature at our doorstep, practically.

Mission impossilbe 4 today. Mom wanted to pay a fine that youngest brother apparently had gotten. Typical old person stuff. Log into the banking app and pay. Nope. Mom had forgotten her pin code and the app was blocked. Okay. Next best option, go the Traffic Department in Humansdorp (about a 25 minute drive) and pay at the counter. In typical Mission Impossible style, the traffic department was closed for lunch, 13h00-13h30. It was 13h15 and a Friday afternoon and they close at 14h00 on a Friday. What are the chances that they would re-open for a half an hour. I would not bet on it.

Humansdorp is a typical African rural town. Chaos reigns. People cross the street at random and we had to brake for a 3 year old kid who just ran full tilt across the street infront of the car on the other side of the street and ours. About 15 seconds later Father sped after kiddie and with no regard to traffic swooped the child up into his arms. People walk down the middle of the road and it is a whirlwind of chaos. I have to agree with Ingrid's word. Chaos, one has to be very wary in the car and look in 12 different directions at once. Cars stop in the middle of the road without warning and offload passengers. Only in Africa. This chaos has its charm. WTF not? As long as everyone gets to where they are going and the job gets done, where is the harm? As weird as it seems, I like to take the route through the town centre every now and again to marvel and wonder at the total lack of order, but yet it functions. I love it!

Traffic department was closed, so the next option was the bank. They could reactivate Moms banking app and we entered a sort of oasis and sat down. We were in a queue, but not sure how they were going to organise the customers. The lady at customer service came out and started handing out numbers. We were nr 2. and nr 1 was at the counter. A little later a man entered and he was given the nr 7. Silently I had started a stop watch to see how long it would be before we were served. It was not that I was counting, but just curious.

Mr 7 began to chirp the customer service lady from his seat and chirp the lady (nr 1) who was being served. Yes, he was Mr van de Merwe and they were well know in the town. Could lady help him and shift him up the list? All in a joking air, but we all knew that he was serious. My fok! What an irritating prick! (Sorry, but sometimes one has to call a spade a spade).

A second lady took a seat and called nr 2. That was us. Mr 7 would sigh and kept asking if he could be bumped down the list. We got down to business and kind lady from the bank walked us through the process and was very patient and gentle with Mom. Without going into detail I felt so sorry for Mom when she could not remember some things that we needed to complete the process. We were looking for the sim card code after having to restart her phone. I phone a help line, brother and thankfully he answered the phone. Brother has had to deal with the old people in our absence and we had a simple conversation. No he did not know the sim code. 

Without the sim card code we were out of business and had wasted our time and bank lady's but most importantly Mr 7;s time.  Aisde: Nr 1 had finished and Mr 7 told an old lady sitting in the waiting room that it was her turn. No! It was not her turn and who are you to now dictate who is next in line. I knew where this was going and MY FOK it makes me FRIKKING irritated that he thought that he was an entitled local, Mr van de Merwe who's Dad had been a Dentist in the town. I do not get cross easily, but once again I will say MY FOK, I could had given his jaw a dislocation!

Back to Mom. She had a few pieces of paper in her phone case, so I took them out and opened them 1 by 1. Oftentimes older people will have their pin codes or the likes written on a piece of paper. We see it quite often in my office.  A four digit code... on one of the papers I found a few numbers and words, only 1 four number word?  on the paper. I punched it into her phone an Bingo. Jackpot !! (not the house). 

From there bank lady did her job and within a few minutes we were almost home. Patience with the old people. Bank lady asked her to choose a new 5 number login code and somehow Mom managed to bos it (F... it up) and the app was again blocked. Facial recognition and another attempt. I punched in a 5 letter code this time and we were again in business. Sorted.

We stood up to leave and Mr 7 once again pushed an old lady saying, it is your turn. Old lady, being an old lady listened and stood up to go to the counter. No! She was not next in line. I have to say it in South African terms, a black lady was next in line and yet Mr 7 thought that old lady deserved preferential treatment because she was white! Apartheid left the building in 1995 and we are nearly 30 years further.

Apartheid or no apartheid, we may not all be equal in many aspects, intelligence, looks, race, height etc, but MY FOK we unfortunately will always be faced with arrogant, entitled thinking fuckers and very unfortunatley the world will never be rid of them. My cup was full and I looked Mr 7 in the eye and said, Buddy, we are all in the queue and will just have to wait our turn. If you wanted be served earlier, then you should have arrived earlier like all the others waiting in line. Moer! I was livid!!! I had to check the right foot on the way home. If I got a fine for speeding I was going to go back to the bank and present Mr 7 with the bill! Breathe Glen! Breathe!

Mission accomplished. Time for the reward. We were all a little hungry and most of the coffee shops close at 3pm. Some at 2pm. We drove to the Village and I sent Mom and Ingrid ahead to the Kitchen which was still open while I went to Baker Barry for our Vegetable Lasagne. I joined them for a welcome cup of coffee and a toasted chicken mayo sandwich with gherkin. Boy, I did not think that I was hangry, but that definately altered my mood at least. Ingrid and Mom ordered a pice of cake as a takeway for tonight.

At Jackpot I felt the need for an afternooner before my Friday evening paddle at Granny's Pools. I was dead to the world for about 45 minutes. Enough time thereafter for a cup of tea and to put Dusty's hairbands (soft top roof racks) on and tie down the surfski. The wind had dropped according to weather man's predictions. We were a go for the evening paddle!

Not many paddlers tonight, just the 3 of us and Phil who was catching waves when we got there. It was once again not a very challenging paddle, but I think that any paddle when one is up against time is never going to be a walk in the park. Phil did not paddle with us so it was Jaco and I head to head to the turning bouy at the harbour. Jaco managed to pull out a bit of a lead on the return journey. On our way back we met Phil who was going to do the course anyhow. Paddle reward, Friday evening? A beer and a chat. Thanks for the beer Frank!

I sent Ingrid an app OMW (On my way). This is usally a sign of. I am Okay and she can put the lasagne in the oven to get a 15 minute start. When I came home, the lasagne was still on the counter top. It was still frozen solid and a no go for dinner tonight. Improvise time. Ingrid had a pizza in the freezer and I had some lamb chops in the fridge. I found some mini courgettes and that was going to be dinner for Mom and I. My favourite, Lamb chops.

Mission Impossible 4 phase number next. Baby brother is linked to Moms bank account some how, so he may or may not have been kicked out of the inlog system.... Time to warn him. Boetie seems to have been locked out, so perhaps another trip to the bank is advised next week. Maybe bright and early Monday morning? I am waiting for Boetie to let us know. He is about 13 hours ahead of us and on an Island bewteen Australia and Fiji. Good morning boetie!