Whilst I finish up my penultimate day at the New Media Lab and get ready to say goodbye to Grahamstown forever *sob* I decided to follow in the tradition started by the young Vincent Maher – who left the NML last year — and compiled a list of ‘Best & Worst’ experiences in my several years here.

So, in no specific order, here goes:

BEST

• Working with Vincent ‘Mad’ Maher
• Travelling to the Netherlands (2X), France, Tunisia, Brazil, USA, Austria
• Playing soccer with Heineken beer cans in our hotel room at The Don during Commons Sense (Creative Commons SA)
• Being able to actually drive around (Grahams)town with your car windows down
• Receiving the Colin “Perfect Teeth” Daniels award from the class of 2005
• Designing & developing Highway Africa’s first database-driven site and registration system
• Meeting a lifetime’s worth of friends and industry contacts
• Beating Vincent at Quake 3 and The Battle for Middle Earth 2 multi-player (although he will be sure to deny it!)

WORST

• Living with one of the crappest climates in the country
• Hearing about the debauchery that our students engaged in on the weekends every Monday morning (you know who you are!!!)
• Waking up with nasty hangovers and very little sleep during consecutive Highway Africa Conferences
• Having to light candles and take cold showers because the only place you can buy pre-paid electricity in Grahamstown is from the Municipality!!!
• The extra 5 hours transit time and R2500 additional airfare cost travelling abroad from Grahamstown
• Being forced to shop at Checkers because of all the people you have to avoid at Pick ‘n Pay where the whole town converges
• Losing a year’s worth of blog entries and NML projects when our web server was stolen (beginning of 2006)

Well, as the nostalgia starts to turn into emotional despair, I eagerly await the new year in jo’burg and venture into the unknown at the Sunday Times.

Oh well. All good things must come to an end and even better things must start!