Strike!

So, remember that comment I made earlier about wanting to experience "real" South Africa? Well, it turns out I may doing just that, in a strange sort of way.

Sarah and I did not go to work today because of the national labor strike that is going on here. For those of you who aren't up on your South African current events, government workers have been on strike for about the last 10 days because they want a pay increase of 10%--while the government is only offering them 6%. Today Willie Madisha, president of the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu), is predicting that a total of two million workers are going to take part in the strike.

The therapists we are working with at the hospital aren't directly involved in the strike, although many nurses have stopped coming into work. Yesterday I heard that infants who are being admitted into the ICU are dying because there is no one around to feed and change them.

Don't worry, though. We're not in any serious danger, they just wanted to be on the safe side and make sure the American exchange students don't get into any bad situations.