Mariental makes do

WHILE the floodwater that rushed through Mariental’s central business district over the weekend brought most businesses to a standstill, the one shop not directly affected by the flood now faces the pressure of supplying the needs of the entire town.

Since Saturday, lines of customers have queued up at cash registers at the Market OK Mariental situated on the dry side of town, while food rarely spends more than an hour on the shelves. “People think it’s all about the money, but we’re just trying to keep up with the demand,” owner Jan van der Merwe told The Namibian last week between helping customers.Between Monday and Wednesday, he said, the shop had placed two orders for soft drinks with supplier Namibia Beverages, while they were up all night between Tuesday and Wednesday to make sure they had enough bread.”We were baking bread until 12 o’clock (midnight) and then started baking again at four o’clock (a.m.).But luckily we had 3 000 loaves ready today,” he said on Wednesday.”Everything else is closed, from the China-shop to Metro.Everything.We’re really catering for more than we usually can handle,” he said.To top it all, he is grappling with a staff shortage, as many of his employees’ homes were flooded.”Most of my key staff, like in admin, are concentrating on the situation at their homes, and especially the service department is struggling to keep up,” he says.Another problem is that his stock is running out, and orders for South African goods take six weeks to arrive.During the crisis, the shop sold goods worth more than N$3 million.”I don’t want it to sound like I’m bragging; I don’t want it to seem like I enjoy benefiting from people’s pain,” he was quick to point out.The influx of customers also brought the added threat of shoplifting, and he said they had caught a small number of culprits in the last week.”But generally Mariental’s people are not bad.They’re not thieves,” he said, adding that he was willing to make the sacrifice.Another service that was unaffected during the floods was TransNamib’s passenger train service, which runs every night except on Saturdays.According to Mariental stationmaster Gerson Kauraisa, no damage was caused to the railway, which was the dividing line between the flooded area and the rest of the town.”Our trains operated during normal hours, and besides the normal maintenance work there wasn’t any special need on the railway,” he said.Kauraisa said the floods also didn’t seem to have any effect on the number of people choosing to travel by train while the main road running past Mariental was closed because of the flood.”Maybe some people were afraid of possible damage to the railway and that’s why they decided not to take the train, but the number of passengers didn’t significantly increase or decrease,” he said.The only effect the flood has had on the rail service is that train tickets have to be issued manually for now because there is no electricity at the station, he said.”People think it’s all about the money, but we’re just trying to keep up with the demand,” owner Jan van der Merwe told The Namibian last week between helping customers.Between Monday and Wednesday, he said, the shop had placed two orders for soft drinks with supplier Namibia Beverages, while they were up all night between Tuesday and Wednesday to make sure they had enough bread.”We were baking bread until 12 o’clock (midnight) and then started baking again at four o’clock (a.m.).But luckily we had 3 000 loaves ready today,” he said on Wednesday.”Everything else is closed, from the China-shop to Metro.Everything.We’re really catering for more than we usually can handle,” he said.To top it all, he is grappling with a staff shortage, as many of his employees’ homes were flooded.”Most of my key staff, like in admin, are concentrating on the situation at their homes, and especially the service department is struggling to keep up,” he says.Another problem is that his stock is running out, and orders for South African goods take six weeks to arrive.During the crisis, the shop sold goods worth more than N$3 million.”I don’t want it to sound like I’m bragging; I don’t want it to seem like I enjoy benefiting from people’s pain,” he was quick to point out.The influx of customers also brought the added threat of shoplifting, and he said they had caught a small number of culprits in the last week.”But generally Mariental’s people are not bad.They’re not thieves,” he said, adding that he was willing to make the sacrifice.Another service that was unaffected during the floods was TransNamib’s passenger train service, which runs every night except on Saturdays.According to Mariental stationmaster Gerson Kauraisa, no damage was caused to the railway, which was the dividing line between the flooded area and the rest of the town.”Our trains operated during normal hours, and besides the normal maintenance work there wasn’t any special need on the railway,” he said.Kauraisa said the floods also didn’t seem to have any effect on the number of people choosing to travel by train while the main road running past Mariental was closed because of the flood.”Maybe some people were afraid of possible damage to the railway and that’s why they decided not to take the train, but the number of passengers didn’t significantly increase or decrease,” he said.The only effect the flood has had on the rail service is that train tickets have to be issued manually for now because there is no electricity at the station, he said.