I bought a bike on Gumtree on Nelson Mandela’s birthday. It’s essentially been the bane of my existence so far.

It currently resides in my friend Matt’s room. To buy the bike, I walked 3 miles from UCT to 9 Pineland drive in Rondesbosch. Bought the bike from a british soldier for 400 rand. Bike turned out to have two flat tries which I figured I could inflate, otherwise it was in great shape. Walked another 3 miles to my homestay in Mowbray and went to two different gas stations to inflate my tires, neither of which could do so since their air pumps are designed for cars. Walked to Liesbeeck and took the Jammie to Claremont where I walked another mile to the bike shop. There I was told that not only had I overpaid but one of the tires had a puncture. 255 rand later I got a u-bar bike lock and fixed tires I rode the 3 miles back to Liesbeeck.

While taking the last tie on the u-bar package off with Matt’s knife I cut my right hand in the fleshy bit between my thumb and forefinger down to my thumb bone through my muscle. Blood started gushing out in spurts. Plup plup, plup plup. Haley quickly helped me, rose my hand above my heart, bandaged up. Was driven to a public hospital ER by Quinton. Waited for an hour or two and there was only one doctor, an off duty resident in a zip up hoodie there. So the bike cost me from 12 noon to 1030 at night, stitches and an extra 1420 rand for the hospital visit (South Africa having privatized healthcare and public hospitals requiring payment before treatment.). Stiches are out as of Sunday, courtesy of Haley. I realized I can’t shake people’s hands yet, as blood tend to come out of the wound when I do so.

Now here’s the kicker. The tire the bike shop fixed is flat, again. Back to the bike shop…