Time. Or the lack/abundance thereof.

Hootie and the Blowfish wrote a song about time. And if you were even half conscious during the mid-90s, you have heard it before. It was an ok song. He sang something like:

TIME's a wasting
TIME's a something
TIME you ain't no friend of miiiine...

I think he was hinting that time seemed to be always running against him, or going too fast. But who really knows? Hootie was a funny guy. So cryptic in his lyrics. Anyway, point is, I don't believe Hootie (or his Blowfish) had ever been to Africa. If he had been, he would have had a very different concept and maybe even written an entirely different song about time. I don't blame Hootie for not being to Africa. But I'm here to explain why thing's might have changed so drastically had he been a visitor to the motherland.

Side note before we get started: For those of you keeping count, my mosquito kill count is currently at 132. And somehow the pests become more and more invisible as the nites go on. I'm getting very good at killing them once they've entered my ear cavity at nite, though it's not a pleasant clean up job.

It's now just before 6 am. Though you'd never know it by checking the wall clock in my house. It has been stuck at 12:47 and 46 seconds for months. I see it as a perfect symbol and a daily reminder that I am now running on Africa time. I have been up for 45 minutes, as has the sun. Now, maybe it's just me, but 5:15 seems a wee bit early for the sun to rise. It really doesn't matter. People start mulling about any time they please. Sunrise means rise and shine for kids going to school that day, 8-10 am for those with nothing better to do with their day, and some as early as 3 am to get a head start on the people they intend to steal from. Sadly, this does happen quite frequently. Poverty + Unemployment = Crime.

But this isn't about crime in SA. This entry is to attempt to shed some light on the issue of time in this country, if not this entire continent.

I will start out by stating that all of South Africa is on the same time zone, even though technically, the country should fall under 2 time zones. I imagine that this makes things easier on a national scale, though I'm not quite sure how, but it confused the hell out of me the first time I came out east to my site and it got dark a whole hour earlier than it was supposed to. I honestly thought my watch had been screwed up overnite, or that I had been completely delusional about what time the sun actually set every evening for the first 7 weeks of my stay. I was soon informed of the time zone situation. Hooray for not being delusional.

I am currrently writing up a proposal to the government here to further reduce the number of time zones in Soth Africa to zero. You see, people don't abide by time constraints like we're used to in the US. Times set to meet, to start something, to arrive somewhere, are all taken as guidelines rather than concrete agreements. (Just like Deltones practice, as I recall) Unless of course it's 8:00 pm. Generations (the most popular soap opera here, which is in Zulu) comes on then, and whole families and most often their American Peace Corps volunteers who stay with them, come together to watch it. But regardless. The attitude towards time here can be very convenient and sometimes relaxing when you don't feel like rushing to get something done or when you can't get to a meeting on time because you have no mode of transport, or something similar. However, as Americans, we often like to get things done or have things done now now now. When this doesn't happen as fast as we would like, we get mad mad mad. Or just irked off a bit at first. But give it some time. It grates on you after a while.

Take fast food for instance. There actually is no such thing as fast food here. If you go to a fast food place like a Chicken Licken, or a Steers, expecting to put an order in, wait 3 minutes, get your food, get in the car and go, you must be reminded that these places do not exist in America, you are in fact in South Africa, and you will wait 15 sometimes 20 minutes for a single chicken burger with nothing on it but mayo. (Mayo is put on a lot of things here I've realized) Our first restaurant experience in SA was touched on earlier in my blog. We waited almost 2 full hours to see our food. The first hour and a half was just waiting to get a waitress.

We have all learned some key terms when it comes to South Africans' concept of time. Here below are short sayings, which I translated into english for your convenience.

1- Just Now - used as in "We're going just now."
American translation = anywhere from 15 minutes to an hour, depending on who said it. Sometimes used when referring to past tense as well. "I got back just now." - also alludes to anywhere from 15 minutes to an hour ago.

2- Now Now - used as in "I'll be back now now."
American translation = about 5 minutes or sooner. "Now now" is supposed to mean immediately, or at this very second. You'll find it's misused often, or maybe confused somewhat intentionally with "just now".

3- Tomorrow - as in "I'll get back to you tomorrow."
American translation = well... there are two. 1- Never 2- Fuck off.

The first time it was really made obvious to me that there was an entire culture of not caring about time (for better or worse) was during my overnite stay in Soweto in 2005. After staying out rather late with my hosts (who were all in their mid-20s) going to various house parties and shebeens and feeling completely awkward as I was rubbed up against by every passing person who was overly sweaty, smelly and drunk and wanted to be near the strange bearded white guy, we were supposed to meet up with the rest of the group at a big church in Soweto the next morning, around 9:00 am. I woke up the next morning around 7:30, feeling very tired and strange about the events from the previous nite, but got dressed, gathered my things, and headed to the main house to meet my host brother and his gogo for breakfast. I get there, and there is no host brother and no breakfast. Just gogo, who didn't speak any English, sitting with a cup og tea, watching her TV. Fifteen minutes later, host brother enters. We then go for a walk to find breakfast. The walk takes about 35 minutes round trip. Eating breakfast slowly with gogo takes another half hour. Walking to find host brother's friends takes 20 minutes. Waking friends up takes 10. Getting one of them ready to come with us takes 25. Walking to pick up a kombi takes 10. Waiting for a kombi takes 10 (though I was assured it never takes that long to find a kombi in Soweto). Kombi ride takes 15. By the time we arrived, the church service was ending - and for those of you who don't know, church services here are very long. Usually over 2 hours.

What stuck out more than anything about this whole experience was not so much the process or amount of time it took to accomplish the simple task of going to church, and getting there on time. While on the way to the kombi, I asked my host brother and his friend if they were concerned at all about getting to where we had to be on time. His friend responded with something that shocked me a little bit. He said, "Pshh, man... as a black man it doesn't matter what time I get somewhere... As long as I'm there." That small comment opened up worlds of understanding about the mindset here.

I have to admit - on the whole, I rather enjoy this change of pace from the

"Crap, I've only got 3 hours until my paper's due and I haven't even started research yet."

Or

"Rehearal is starting - where the hell is Colin?"

Or the ever hectic

"Today I've got class at 9 and 10:15, meeting at 11:30, I want to eat lunch sometime, class at 1, work from 2 - 5, I'm meeting this person for dinner at 5:30, then I have rehearsal 7 - 10 then I have to meet with 2 peope to study for a philosophy test tomorrow, which is actually at the same time as part testing, so after the test I have to run to the music building and hope I'll be allowed to part test later, then I have to go and pick up this person from the train, and then I have a music lesson and then I'm the lead dancer in my dance show which is actually happening OH CRAP THE SHOW STARTED 20 MINUTES AGO."

The good side of African time includes not worrying when our kombi breaks down X number or times, thus putting us massively behind schedule to get where we're supposed to be. You know that when you arrive a few hours (or days) late, you can explain - kombi broke down - or you can at least expect not to be grilled on why you've come so late.

The other day, I started my 10 minute walk to the farm after numerous unsuccessful attempts at trying to find a trail that leads to the other side of the stream here. I got about half way to the main house, until I met "Uncle Leo" and his dog Zeus (a small daschund), who were on their way to check on Leo's herb garden, which is on my side of the road. We talked for a minute or two, and then I asked to join him. He was glad for the company, and eager to show off how well his herbs were coming in. Leo walks incredibly slow, which can be frustrating when trying to rush somewhere, but in the case of that day, we didn't need to walk any faster than Leo's walking stick reccomended. We were out on our errand for a long while, and I arrived at the farm an entire hour and a half after I had originally intended to. In my excursion, I was able to talk to Leo on a more personal level than when we are at the farm, and I learned a bit more about his past, his passions, and the depth of his knowledge on various subjects from herbal gardening, to world history. It made me understand why it's not important to be rushing to a destination all the time, especially here in South Africa. It works to my advantage to just let things happen, and not be hesitant to do something that hasn't been planned ahead of time.

These types of events are what make so many memorable life experiences. Unexpected and spontaneous detours, saying "Ah, what the hell? Why not?" and just going and letting things happen. We seem unable to do that many times in our lives in the US, because we are always expected to be somewhere, to be doing something specific, to be abiding by our planned out day schedule.

Here, we can definitely set our own schedule, and then, if we find it's not working for us, we can just change it or disregard it altogether.

Do I have a point in all this rambling? Or any type of conslusion? Probably not. I can get you one by next week though. Just be prepared to wait a month.