tim's experiment

It seems strange not to write about the epidemic when it is the main thing in most of our lives at the moment. But there is a danger here. When toddlers are dying in the arms of their helpless parents complaints about disruption of holiday arrangements look in dubious taste.

So please – I record; I do not complain. For me, as for most Hongkongers who can afford them at all, holidays were actually the first thing to go. It occurred to me the other day that I have now slept in the same bed for some 800 consecutive nights. I don’t think this has happened before.

Our city is a small place. Unlike many less lucky expat citizens I have not missed funerals or weddings in distant countries. It is electronically easy to keep in touch with distant siblings. Travel is a luxury. But still…

Then the artistic hobbies started disappearing. Wind instruments are fine things but nobody wants to find out if the virus can survive transmission through the tubes. In any case, performances are out. The pub where I used to drum in the traditional Irish fashion struggled through the restrictions for a while and then closed for good. The dance scene came briefly back to life last year but now all the venues are closed again. 

Work, of which I do not do much, became increasingly from home and is now entirely so.

So here I sit on a New Territories hilltop, quite close to locked down already. I go out once or twice a week for shopping. Last week I had lunch with a friend and we both felt it necessary to explain why we were taking the risk. Actually it is not that dangerous at present because restaurants are deserted. But you have to get there.

The sensation is a bit prison-like, but it is prison as experienced by Ms Meng Wanzhou in house arrest in Vancouver. Large house, helper, garden, allowed out during day…

Fortunately the latest dog is young, restless and very fit. So I am dragged out of the house quite a lot. I have observed the anthropology of our local piece of country park with interest. Last year our walk involved encounters with the other regulars – who number maybe half a dozen – and the occasional long-distance hiker. 

Our path into the hills was not particularly famous or popular. It seemed quite a lot of the people who came down it had missed the turning to Shatin. Some of them were not quite sure where they were.

Since the closure of almost everything, walking in the hills has become much more popular. I am surprised by the number of working age people who can apparently get away for long hikes on weekdays. Are they all “working from hill”?

At weekends we get a lot of family parties looking for somewhere for the kids to play. Official playgrounds are all closed. As well there are a lot of hikers. We have not quite reached the level of overcrowding in the famous picture of people queueing for the difficult bit of Everest. But some of the more popular trails must be getting close.

For shorter walks the dog and I go round the small car park at the top of Sui Wo Road. This also has changed. Traditionally, couples park car and walk to the nearby Lions Lookout for romantic contemplation of the Shing Mun valley in the moonlight.

When restaurants were required to close at 6 this was supplemented by outdoor dining. Some groups just spread a blanket on the nearby patch of grass. Other groups had more elaborate arrangements involving folding chairs and tables.

On the evening of Saint Valentine’s Day the dog took me out at 9 pm and the car park looked different. Eventually I realised that this was because all the cars had their inside lights on. The car park was full, and every car contained two people having a romantic dinner.

One does not stare through car windows, but walking the dog provides an excuse for strolling slowly by and it appeared that the fare on offer ranged from His and Hers pot noodles to an elaborate arrangement involving a table rigged up between the two front seats with six quite appealing dishes on it.

I am not sure whether this counts as impressive or sad. Obviously it is only open to young men with access to a vehicle so it is a solution for  the affluent. Whether dinner led on to other things I do not know but at midnight when I took the hound out again some of the cars were still there – with the lights off.

Meanwhile Omicron was working its way towards us. Last week there were cases in Sui Wo Estate down the road. This week, one on our estate. This is not a huge problem. We all live in separate houses so there is no shared lift. As long as nobody else gets it we shall not be subjected to compulsory testing, let along lockdown.

Still, now that Dynamic Zero has been supplanted by Dynamic Several Thousand it is worth wondering how we got here. After all the original COVID was a bolt from the blue. Nobody was expecting it. Omicron, on the other hand, has been working its way towards us for months. Yet we were not ready.

I am reminded of the scene at the end of “Chernobyl” where one of the heroes contemplates the history of Chernobyl the town: “It was mostly Jews and Poles. The Jews were killed in pogroms and Stalin forced the Poles out. Then the Nazis came and killed whoever was left. And after the war, people came and lived here anyway. They knew that the ground under their feet was soaked in blood but they didn’t care. Dead Jews, dead Poles, not them. No-one ever thinks it’s going to happen to them. And here we are.”

Here we are indeed.