sparks not flying

There’s been no power at the Cultural Centre for two days now. Without lights, it’s too dark to use books, and it’s bloody cold. I managed with speaking and verbal games until the first break yesterday, and then agreed with the students that we give up. But we teachers still had to hang around until two o’clock. Chilled through. Today was better: no attempt at teaching, and we were away before ten. God only knows what’ll happen tomorrow. The story is, GECOL (that’s the General Electrical Company of Libya, whose employees we’re teaching) have leased the Centre, and it wasn’t designed for the amount of use it’s now getting; therefore, the electricity cable isn’t up to the supply, and shorts out – a new cable is required. The Centre’s landlord – whoever that is, probably another government department, - might be forgiven for thinking it’ll get the cable upgraded on the cheap, seeing as the tenant is the electricity board. But life is rarely that simple, eh?

I’d love to say that I gave the rest of the morning over to writing tests, and making a start to the preliminary reading for my MA in applied linguistics. Alas, it was instead devoted to my continuing addiction to Caesar III: I’m stuck in Carthago, as a mere Procurator.

And I can't get any information regarding this Heavenly States gig. Bollocks.



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