On March 10, 2020, our first day of self-isolation, Australia has a total of 112 active cases of Coronavirus, 18 of which are in my home state of Victoria and 1 of whom has already crossed paths with my son.
On this same day, the Premier of Victoria releases his government’s Covid-19 Pandemic Plan for the Victorian Health Sector.
He warns the people of Victoria to expect “extreme measures” to help suppress the spread of the virus, includng statewide lockdowns, work from home orders for entire sectors of the economy and the cancellation of major sporting events.
On this same day, Italy, one of the worst affected countries in Europe, goes into nationwide lockdown.
Spain follows four days later.
Toby calls me to say he’s hearing a whisper that we will also be in lockdown within days.
I receive a call from a mate who runs Australia’s leading craft beer website, The Crafty Pint.
He wants to know how I view the current situation for pubs and and the craft beer industry based on my previous experience and what I think is in store for the future. I tell him that as a rule people normally drink more when times are tough but this is an unprecedented situation and its going to be extremely difficult to drown your sorrows at the local if we all go into lockdown.
The interview, is published on the Crafty website the following day and becomes the first in a ongoing series of interviews and stories about how key players in the craft brewing scene manage to survive the pandemic.
By March 12, the day I was originally scheduled to fly back to Indonesia, the number of confirmed cases in Victoria has doubled to 36.
Tom Hanks and his wife Rita Wilson test positive to Coronavirus in Queensland where Hanks is on location for an upcoming movie shoot. Both are now in quarantine but are only experiencing mild symptoms.
Case numbers now are surging around the world. The WHO officially declares Covid-19 a global pandemic and, Toby was right, the Australian Prime Minister announces we are also headed into lockdown.
By now, news coverage of the pandemic has all but eclipsed regular TV programming. The Prime Minister of Australia, Scott Morrison, gives a live address to the nation, echoing the advice of his Chief Medical Officer. Contact tracing and quarantine will be the primary methods of containment. Social distancing and regular handwashing, the best ways to avoid catching the virus.
His voice is calm, his tone measured and self-assured.
On this day he unveils a $17.6 billion dollar stimulus package, “to protect Australians health, secure jobs, and set the economy to bounce back from this crisis”.
“Together we will get through this.”
Three months earlier, he’d earned the wrath of the entire nation when he was found to be holidaying in Hawaii while large parts of the country burned in the most devestating bushfires the country has ever witnessed.
Heading a government that has steadfastly preached a doctrine of fiscal austerity and climate change denial he is now a front man for medical science and fiscal largesse, deftly steering the nation and its economy to safety from this latest and most imminent threat to the human race.
He is now the one man who will surely be saved by this virus.
A modern day Lazarus.
Risen from the ashes.
In the first few days of self isolation mum and I occupy ourselves by following the events unfolding on TV and by sunning ourselves on her back balcony, enjoying our view over the lake.
This group of Corella accompanied us during our time in self-isolation
Graeme has dropped off supplies including beer, red wine, white wine, milk and cereal. The essentials. The nursing home kitchen is supplying lunch and dinner for the two of us.
I message Dewi and Toby regularly and let the landlords know that the medical advice I received is to take no action but to keep an eye out for symptoms.
I also have a fairly length email to write to our lawyer, offering a point by point breakdown of our recent meeting with said landlords.
I decide to postpone my flight back to Indonesia for two weeks. I’m now scheduled to fly out on March 24.
Dewi calls to say that she and her family are becoming increasingly concerned by the risk involved with keeping the guesthouse open. We agree that it will be best to close immediately but that it should be safe enough to continue building the house.
We are ahead of the local authorities by about a week and every hotel and guesthouse in Mataram City is ordered to lockdown.
Dewi decides to leave our rental property, which is located close by and move into the guesthouse where she can be accompanied by her aunt and a couple of her nephews.
Mum and I are now entering our second week of self isolation and we’re holding up pretty well. Neither she, Josh nor I are exhibiting any symptoms.
The pub is now closed but we are able to retain a skeleton staff to sell takeaway food and booze. In fact we are considered to be an essential service, providing sustenance and support to people in lockdown and as such are able to offer home delivery.
Toby stocked up on jumbo toilet rolls via one of our supplies a week before the lockdown and is now offering that plus hand santiser which is produced in house, free with every home delivery.
He is thriving in a crisis and the story of him doing home deliveries in the pub ute stocked full of free emergency supplies is picked up by the Melbourne edition of lifestyle web-zine, “Broadsheet.”
I bought three books for mum’s birthday about women who have carved out unique places for themselves in history. I hoped she would find them engaging.
I also want to read them myself and it seems I have now been gifted an opportunity, so I’m ready to settle in to a few days of good book reading.
The first book I pick up is “Truganini”, the story of an indigenous woman from the tiny Australian island of Tasmania who becomes the last surviving member of her tribe.
It is a confronting yet compelling read and a startling reminder of my people’s inherent inability to reset its genocidal relationship with indigenous Australians.
Our forebears almost certainly saw indigenous people as nothing less than savages and I fear that history will, almost certainly, judge us the same.
Mum begins an historical biography of the Mitford Sisters, six girls born into an aristocratic British family early last century, whose social circle encompased the likes of Adolph Hitler, Winston Churchill and John F Kennedy.
Their pivotal moment in the world spotlight is the time just before and during World War Two, the time of mum’s childhood.
She struggles with the book because a number of the sisters supported socialist and communist causes during this time which scandalised the broader community.
She thinks, with fair reason, they were privileged white girls and more than just a little crazy.
I’m not normally given to writing book reviews but here I am, locked down at the onset of a once in a century global pandemic and, on picking up the life story of the Mitford Sisters I learn new facts that broaden my understanding of major events that shaped the last century.
My surprise takeaway from the book is the realisation that in the years leading up to the Second World War many in England, from the Aristocracy to the working classes, wholeheartedly supported Adolph Hitler’s steady rise to power.
The German economy was in a dire situation after the Great Depression and the country seemed destined to fall under communist party rule.
The young Adolph Hitler’s inspiring oratory rallied the hearts and minds of ordinary German people around the idea of independence and self-determination.
To the eyes and ears of many in England, then the torch bearer of modern, free world values, he also appeared to be a knight in shining armour.
Even as his focus shifted from self-determination to Aryan Supremacy, his anti-semetic rhetoric found an undercurrent of support, not from the sisters, but from within large sections of White Anglo Saxon society.
The one other significant idea I draw from this book is that while the sisters polarised public opinion and were roundly vilified, they are each unwavering in their sense of conviction and make no effort to step back from their beliefs or package their message for general consumption. Indeed, they dismiss criticism from all quarters with an aristocratic indifference, akin to the way you or I might dismiss a fly that is trying to land on our nose.
Whether loved or loathed it is clear that, when compared to one of the most polarising figures of this century, (no, not Xi Jinping) their self belief is anchored in something far more powerful and more enduring than vanity or self interest.
Mum trys reading Truganini but finds it far too harrowing. She has issues enough of her own to deal with, without needing to share the shameful burden of one woman’s colonial oppression.
Two down, one to go.
The third book I bought is “Becoming”, by Michelle Obama.
Although mum probably would have found this more uplifting than the previous two books, she never picks it up.
It has now come into my possession and to date, nether have I.
On March 17, France goes into nationwide lockdown.
On March 18 the Govenor General of Australia declares a Human BioSecuity Emergency, which gives the Health Miinister sweeping powers to impose restrictions on the movement of people and goods and to instigate evacuations.
Twelve months on, the Australian government has repatriated roughly 10% of the Australians stranded overseas who have registered as requiring assistance.
On March 19, Australia’s flagship airline, Qantas, announces it is set to begin cancelling flights ahead of ceasing all international operations by the end of March.
There is confusion around whether my flight is one of the many being cancelled but when I manage to get through to Customer Service I’m told yes it will be flying unless they advise me otherwise.
And It’s our final day of self isolation.
Hooray!
We have escaped with our health in tact and I can now turn my attention to hopefully flying out of the country.
Friday March 20 is our first day of freedom which, like the rest of the country means we are now in lockdown.
The only reason we have to leave the apartment is for exercise, medical attention or to shop for essential items like food, which is already being provided by the nursing home.
Mum however is able to join her friends for meals in the main dining area, which she is keen to do.
For myself I stay put until after the weekend as I don’t want to be responsible for bringing bring the virus back to mum’s apartment or into the nursing home.
The Prime Minister announces a $66 billion dollar relief package to assist businesses and families affected by the lockdown.
On Monday March 23 the UK goes into lockdown.
Local TV network Channel Nine, announces the Gili Islands, a group of three tropical islands off the coast of Lombok, popular with young backpackers, are closing due to the pandemic.
I visit my GP and request a health certificate to show authorities at airport checkpoints.
Graeme has arrived to take me back to his place ahead of a early morning airport run and I say goodbye to mum.
It’s been quite a ride.
Over the course of two weeks in self isolation we have watched the world change in ways no-one could have predicted a few short months ago.
And none of us are out of the woods by a long stretch. But for now I am simply thankful that mum and I were able to cross this major first hurdle.
I tell her I will see her again when I don’t need to self isolate upon arrival for another 14 days.
Talking to Dewi later that night, she informs me that even with a Medical Certificate I be required to self isolate for another 14 days on arrival back in Lombok.
You have got to be kidding me!
