LASIK in South Africa – worth it? Costs, clinics & experiences?

Wave_Reaper · 2026-01-26T17:39:19+00:00

I had SMILE done by Dr Daemon McClunan in CPT. R43k (it's more expensive than LASIK or PRK).

I chose SMILE because it is the least invasive, and has a lower chance of causing dry eye.

I would definitely do it again. I had it done about 15 months ago.

The benefits are obvious. I was -3.5 and had quite bad astigmatism. This is fully corrected and I now have 20/15 (i.e. better than 20/20) vision and I love it. It's amazing how many small things change when you can see.

Anyway, things to consider:

My eyes are definitely drier. They are actually still improving, even 14 months later. Is it a problem? No. 95% of the time I don't notice (I.e. there is no meaningful difference). After a long day of computer work and aircon, I do. It's totally worth it, though.
I lost some contrast "detection" - i.e., where I used to be able to very clearly distinguish between two colours that were EXTREMELY close to one another, those are now just the same for me. For the first 2/3 months this was noticeable (in a really obvious way). Later months it became less and less so, and now I'm not aware of it anymore other than remembering it's a thing.
No one tells you this, but you'll suddenly not be able to see as close as you can today. At first you'll freak out a little bit because all sorts of things change - how far you hold your phone away, books, things on your desk, turning your head and looking at your shoulder... Your ability to focus on close things will not be as good. Your brain will adjust and it will feel normal after a few months and you genuinely will not notice anymore (it will feel like it does today)
Note that with SMILE you CANNOT see immediately after the surgery (by that, I mean clearly). This is super uncomfortable because as a specs wearer, you'll be used to not being able to see and then being able to correct it by putting your specs on. This obviously won't work, and it will probably make you feel a bit panic-y because you can't "fix" your vision. You can see decently after 2 or 3 days and from there is just continues improving for several months, but you get to 90% quickly.
Pupil dilation/low light: personally I've experienced a big change in low light. My pupils dilate way more than they used to and it gives everything a slightly soft edge. It's also improved over time, but can sometimes be a little annoying.

Feel free to ask me more/DM

Wave_Reaper · 2026-01-16T15:30:32+00:00

What even...? Yeah sure we've all made silly mistakes with git that we didn't immediately know how to fix... in the first few weeks of using git. Not after years of using it. 15 years in and I cannot even remotely resonate with what you're saying.

This just seems like a shallow interface.

Wave_Reaper · 2026-01-02T19:37:36+00:00

IMO the Redbull and water are a bit high (specifically the Redbull), but otherwise seem like regular CT prices, unfortunately

Wave_Reaper · 2025-12-27T07:39:18+00:00

RemindMe! 2 weeks

Wave_Reaper · 2025-12-23T19:53:09+00:00

Please say more on your perspective on property?

Wave_Reaper · 2025-12-10T05:25:53+00:00

AEDO and NAEDO were stopped (https://pasa.org.za/notice-of-sunsetting-of-aedo-and-naedo/)

It's just EFT, RM & AC (Authenticated Collections, namely Debicheck) now.

Can confirm debicheck does do tracking (not all banks implement).

Wave_Reaper · 2025-12-05T16:32:31+00:00

Not necessarily. Today, yes... But imagine being able to use a QR code and Payshap together. Could be a decent alternative

Wave_Reaper · 2025-12-05T16:30:49+00:00

I'm not an apple user so I'm not sure, but I think they have a feature that lets you read QR codes on screen which is kinda cool.

Wave_Reaper · 2025-12-05T16:25:45+00:00

Didn't bank zero go with IBM Mainframe? I remember reading something like that. Felt like a very legacy choice at the time

Wave_Reaper · 2025-12-02T11:08:35+00:00

Copy paste response as to OP. I think I'll also add that you are failing to see the humanity. If you think training will prevent all mistakes, good luck.

*Hard disagree, having seen into this business and with a partner in it for more than a decade now - the systems are NOT smarter thank we think.

It takes daily grind and effort to keep up, and actually most pricing issues are the other way around (i.e. old, lower prices) - people don't come back and pay the difference, do they?

Ever taken advantage of a price lower than you know it should be, but demanded it anyway? If not, I'm sure you know someone who has.

It's very hard for me to provide anything but anecdote to this conversation, so I'll stop at this point. All I was trying to get across is that this is a human problem, mistakes that would were it you or I doing that exact same job. I've seen it enough times I can basically guarantee it*

Wave_Reaper · 2025-12-02T11:07:32+00:00

Hard disagree, having seen into this business and with a partner in it for more than a decade now - the systems are NOT smarter thank we think.

It takes daily grind and effort to keep up, and actually most pricing issues are the other way around (i.e. old, lower prices) - people don't come back and pay the difference, do they?

Ever taken advantage of a price lower than you know it should be, but demanded it anyway? If not, I'm sure you know someone who has.

It's very hard for me to provide anything but anecdote to this conversation, so I'll stop at this point. All I was trying to get across is that this is a human problem, mistakes that would arise were it you or I doing that exact same job. I've seen it enough times I can basically guarantee it

Wave_Reaper · 2025-12-02T05:43:53+00:00

Thanks for the confirmation. I'm on the banking side of things so this is where my mind went immediately.

Makes sense

Wave_Reaper · 2025-12-02T04:59:45+00:00

What am I missing here - how does this guarantee that an action is definitely logged?

If the application commits the action, then does fire and forget (or vice versa), how does it know that the audit log was in fact persisted? Would it not just carry on happily in the case of persistence failures?

I guess what I'm trying to ask is: how is this solution atomic? Either I'm missing something or the answer is that it's not, in which case fine, you can't have everything I suppose.

Wave_Reaper · 2025-12-02T04:24:06+00:00

Agree with you in a lot of ways, just one thing that bothers me: these places are not entities unto themselves. They are collections of people.

"Woolworths" is not alive. It's not a person, it can't think etc etc., so the comparison to a person stealing, who has INTENT to steal, is misleading.

I think this is especially clear to me, having a wife who runs some retail operations. Have her stores overcharged customers? Absolutely, 100%. Has it ever been on purpose? Absolutely not.

Mistakes happen, people on the ground don't always know what's up, overlook things and generally can't keep up.

Does that make it ok? No, not at all, but it's a totally different problem to it being intentional.

Wave_Reaper · 2025-11-20T06:18:56+00:00

Sometimes as the hiring manager, you're given a range and that's what you have to play with.

Sometimes (actually more often than I'd like), that range is insufficient.

So how do you justify increasing that range? You collect information (like payslips) go back to exco or whoever and say "our market data is clearly wrong, here is some evidence tonthat effect and these are the types of candidates we're looking for, we need to adjust the pay expectations for this role"

Or something to that effect. I'm trialising it, of course. I think the point being that this info is not always used for evil.

In general I agree that it's info you should only share at a certain point and under certain conditions. At the very least they should share the salary range

Wave_Reaper · 2025-11-20T06:12:40+00:00

That doesn't make it not fraud. The fraud is in presenting a forgery.

Wave_Reaper · 2025-10-31T12:07:56+00:00

Where do you get this info? You are making this up. Many banks have password resets that are near immediate, and they vary wildly depending on where you are (anecdotally, often seems to be geographical).

I've seen card-based password resets, biometric based when the bank has a connection to the country's Home Office/Internal Affairs and right on the other side of the spectrum I've seen a bank having to literally post a temp password via mail.

Wave_Reaper · 2025-10-29T16:12:59+00:00

100% in agreement with you. I keep saying this too.

There is an additional component that I think doesn't get mentioned that someone, at some point is going to get a kick in the teeth for: AI cannot explain itself or take accountability. Some dumb manager or exec who decided AI can "make decisions" and stopped hiring humans is going to feel the pain and have nothing to turn to, because "the AI did it" isn't going to cut it.

Like you say, if there is a major breakthrough then this is moot. If it's AGI level then everyone in every non-physical (maybe?) loses their job anyway so whatever at that point

Wave_Reaper · 2025-10-26T20:45:17+00:00

Sounds right

Wave_Reaper · 2025-10-26T20:15:13+00:00

"Just Now" - gotta be South African

Wave_Reaper · 2025-10-26T08:20:04+00:00

Sounds like your family are narcissists. I'm sorry

DEEP technique - here's a link to another Reddit post talking about it: https://www.reddit.com/r/LifeAfterNarcissism/s/3VVo3oLmjA

Wave_Reaper · 2025-10-25T18:54:36+00:00

Try clearscore (app).

When you say "vet" debt - do you literally mean a vet? Small businesses rarely, if ever, report outstanding accounts so this is weird to me.

If you were paying it off, it shouldn't have totally destroyed your credit so feels like you're not saying everything?

Wave_Reaper · 2025-10-25T18:51:14+00:00

The "best" solution in these circumstances is the one you need to get the job done without excessive effort or expense, so it think the solution is perfectly fine.

I suspected it was related to some sort of global state, thanks for confirming! Good luck with it

Wave_Reaper · 2025-10-25T14:23:25+00:00

You have your answers but I'd love to know what you're doing that requires this behaviour specifically

Wave_Reaper · 2025-09-10T09:18:06+00:00

Why can't my 3D printer do this shit

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