Passages for Summaries & Precis
Living On The Edge In Gauteng
Adapted from You magazine
Overcrowded freeways, dirty air, dusty mine dumps, armed highjackers and electric fences - life in Gauteng isn't easy. Those who stick it out have a more hectic life and worry more about money, tax and promotion.
And that's not all. New research has proved what many have long suspected: Gautengers are also more stressed than their laid-back peers in Cape Town and Durban.
You experience stress when more is expected of you - or you think more is expected of you - than you can deliver, says Professor Eddie Wolff of the Psychology Department of Rand Afrikaans University.
Gautengers may feel too many demands are imposed on them, which makes their stress levels higher than those of Durbanites or Capetonians.
Professor Wolff said research had been conducted in America to establish which cities were unhealthy. Factors considered were the pace of life (one way of measuring this was to examine the walking speed of pedestrians), safety, recreation facilities, public services, transport and housing. The negative side of many of these factors has led to Gautengers' high stress rate.
Exercise
Write a short article for your school magazine which begins, "It is better to live in Cape Town or Durban because...."
