The Two Possible Futures for South Africa

POV 1:

You wake up from the noise of someone breaking into the shed. Again. You send up a silent prayer of gratitude that it wasn’t the main house, and make a mental note to look at the damage later. You get out of bed to make a cup of coffee, but it’s load shedding (Orwellian Newspeak for a Rolling Blackout). Again. No Coffee. You stare at the empty place in bed where your wife used to sleep, before she left. Poverty. Not the most attractive trait in a man.

You would go to work if that still existed as a concept, but it does not. You log into your mobile device with a highly harmful retina scan, to see if your social credit score will allow you to post a Government-approved meme. No go. Just scrolling, then. You swipe past the crypto scam-ads to see if there’s something that could possibly brighten your miserable Wojak-morning, but all you see are the Media24 headlines announcing the remarkable recovery of the economy and the Government’s renewed efforts to eradicate the injustices of APAATHAAID via a shiny, brand-new Commission of Enquiry.

You look up at the ceiling fan and wonder if it would support your weight if you hanged yourself from it.

POV 2:

We get rid of the Whores and Liars. We stop being a f*cking slave colony to thieves, robbers, and murderers. We stop believing bullshit parading as headlines.

You get out of bed, but only make it halfway before your beautiful, loving wife pulls you back in.

“I’m gonna be late for work, bokkie!” you protest.

“Who cares, you own the Gardening Services and it’s doing so well,” she retorts.

No way to defeat that kind of logic. You will, indeed, be about 5 minutes late for work. Delete that. You’ve been working out a bit, you’ll be 15 minutes late.

On your way to work you admire the new, massive roadside Billboard announcing a large new School and Recreational Facility - sponsored by your God-fearing, rational Government - and you wonder why you allowed filthy thieves and liars to steal all of this from you for so long.

***

You, Mister and Missus South African, decide which one will be our future. But hey, take your time deciding. We’ve got Forever! We’re still comfortably hanging from the edge of this ledge with one hand, and there’s only a million-mile-drop to certain death below us. What real South African needs to hang on with both hands, right? LOL. We’re the Springboks, for goodness’ sake; we’re all MMA world champion fighters (with only a string of recent defeats under the belt), we’ll be fine.