Sunday 29th March, 2020
 |
| Nearly 40 years ago, when I was 24, young and happy and with a whole life ahead of me. |
This week was our second week of confinement since the Spanish government announced a State of Emergency just two Sundays ago. Wow, haven't our lives changed? The dramatic rise in numbers tell us that.
To think just one month ago, on 28th February, we had only a handful of cases in Spain and where we are now, in the top few countries leading this most dreadful of leagues. The Sunday before last, 15th March there were 8000 cases and last Sunday, 22nd March that spiraled to 27.000. Over 50% of the cases were and still are in Madrid but spreading fast in other areas. Last night we had 73.235 cases. and 5.982 deaths compared to last week's 25.496 and 1.381! These figures have just rocketed. Last Sunday the total global numbers were 308.000 cases and a death toll of 13.069. Today those figures have risen to 663.079 and 30.857 respectively. But so too has the figure of those recovered which now stands at 142.368 globally. Spain now has the second worst death toll after Italy and the US has gone from 26.892 cases to 123.578 in just week bringing it to the top of the league. I can only hope confinement works as more than a third of the world's population are in lockdown. I can only hope too that the dreadful virus curve flattens out soon here and elsewhere. Confinement, I tell myself, has to work. Below you can see the table from last week and last night's table.
Confinement is a game changer in how we live now compared to our blase way of life in the last 100 or so years which we all took for granted. This affects everything. For example last Sunday was Mothers' day and of course families could no longer get together to celebrate. It was more known to me as "Mothering Sunday" when I lived in the UK as a child. We never celebrated it at home, nor did we celebrate Valentines Day, Halloween or Fathers' Day; just Christmas, Easter, Guy Fawkes Day and of course birthdays. But fast forward to this new century and all of these special days have just become bigger and bigger then when I was a child.
To think just one month ago, on 28th February, we had only a handful of cases in Spain and where we are now, in the top few countries leading this most dreadful of leagues. The Sunday before last, 15th March there were 8000 cases and last Sunday, 22nd March that spiraled to 27.000. Over 50% of the cases were and still are in Madrid but spreading fast in other areas. Last night we had 73.235 cases. and 5.982 deaths compared to last week's 25.496 and 1.381! These figures have just rocketed. Last Sunday the total global numbers were 308.000 cases and a death toll of 13.069. Today those figures have risen to 663.079 and 30.857 respectively. But so too has the figure of those recovered which now stands at 142.368 globally. Spain now has the second worst death toll after Italy and the US has gone from 26.892 cases to 123.578 in just week bringing it to the top of the league. I can only hope confinement works as more than a third of the world's population are in lockdown. I can only hope too that the dreadful virus curve flattens out soon here and elsewhere. Confinement, I tell myself, has to work. Below you can see the table from last week and last night's table.
 |
| Last week's figures |
 |
| Last night's figures |
Confinement is a game changer in how we live now compared to our blase way of life in the last 100 or so years which we all took for granted. This affects everything. For example last Sunday was Mothers' day and of course families could no longer get together to celebrate. It was more known to me as "Mothering Sunday" when I lived in the UK as a child. We never celebrated it at home, nor did we celebrate Valentines Day, Halloween or Fathers' Day; just Christmas, Easter, Guy Fawkes Day and of course birthdays. But fast forward to this new century and all of these special days have just become bigger and bigger then when I was a child.
No doubt it was a different sort of Mothers' Day for many people in the UK who were beginning to self isolate and take social distancing seriously. Not all of them were though and people flocked to the beaches, parks and natural beauty spots. They shouldn't have. They would pay the consequences. My dear daughter who is self isolating in Acton Town, sent me a greeting in the form of this lovely photo of her and me. Also in the picture is little Elliot. It cheered me up. Thanks Suzy.
 |
| My Mothers' Day photo from Suzy |
Suzy was sticking at home only going out for solo bike rides. Worried the general population was not taking the government recommendations to stay home and practice social distancing, Boris Johnson, had no other option than to threaten proper lockdown. In Spain that day, the Prime Minister announced an extension of a further two weeks of the state of emergency. The extension would have to approved by Parliament on 25th March but, as the main opposition parties have given their full support to the government, the extension was taken as a given. In fact people had expected it and the large majority are sticking to the rules. I found it funny that other countries were not taking the situation as seriously and they too would suffer if they took or take decisions too late. In Spain we took it too late, in Italy they did too, as did many other countries, not to mention the US which is now at the top of the league of the most affected countries. I'm surprised countries didn't or don't after seeing how life is as the virus spreads in countries around world, the US, Italy and now Spain being the big examples.
Our worlds have been disrupted. We may complain at not being able to go outside or not being able to watch football matches or other sporting activities. But they are no longer important. The only important thing is that we keep safe and also flatten the curve to ensure our health systems don't collapse although for many who already are, it comes too late. There will be time after this to do all the things we like to do in a normal world. So I was not at all surprised to hear more noise that day over the possible cancellation of the upcoming Olympic Games in Japan. In fact I thought it would be crazy to go ahead with them.
For us at home it was our 8th day of confinement and we took it philosophically and without complaint, trying to keep positive even when we heard bad news. I think I was a bit upset to hear that of all those affected in Spain, 15% of them were medical staff. They are our soldiers in the front line of this biological battle and need to be more protected. The general lack worldwide of protective equipment hasn't helped. More celebrities or famous people became infected as, of course, the virus does not discriminate between people or classes. That day we heard that the Spanish opera singer, Plácido Domingo, recently disgraced over sexual harassment behaviour, had tested positive in New York, the US hotspot this week. He is 79 so in the danger age bracket. Coincidentally, the even more disgraced, figure, Harvey Weinstein, now serving a 23 year prison sentence, also tested positive. Aged 68, he apparently was infected in prison. I'm not saying I am not sorry for them, as I wouldn't wish this illness on anyone, but I'm not as sorry for them as I am for other people. I was more sorry for our own Prime Minister, Pedro Sánchez. No wonder his face gets more grim as the days plod on and he has his own battles at home. Not only does his wife have the virus, his mother has it too as does his father-in-law. In his cabinet there are now three cases, the latest being his Vice President Carmen Calvo who was in hospital with "respiratory problems". Later in the week she was discharged. She was being highly criticised for going to a prestigious private hospital, "Ruber". I don't criticise her for that. I criticise her for being one of those who allowed the massive women's day demonstration on 8th March where 120.000 people in the centre of the country rallied in close contact with each other. That shouldn't have happened. I have a private health insurance policy I pay for so if I get ill I will also "go private". That's my choice.My husband, however, who was a state teacher has a state health policy which is for private health services. Many civil servants have that too and no doubt Carmen Calvo does for the same reason. Thus I don't think she should be criticised. But these days there is a lot of the blaming game going on. As I said not so long ago, this crisis brings out both the best and the worst in people. We have new breeds of people here, the negative groups of so-called "balcony police" - people invigilating and shouting out nasty words to passersby they think are flouting the rules. Most often they are either hospital workers or even mothers with autistic children who are allowed out. The other breed is what I call "confinement shamers" - pretty similar to the "balcony police". Both breeds of people gleefully snitch on neighbours reminding us of society under communism or the Nazi regime. Thankfully at the other end of the spectrum we have armies of volunteers doing heroic work wherever they can lend a helping hand. As I keep witnessing, this crisis brings out both the best and the worst in people.
Our day was quiet and ordered with a routine we both follow so as to keep positive and sane, as well as busy. I cooked that morning, making the Spanish Asturian bean dish called "fabada". My husband and father love it. I was good and had some steak and vegetables instead. I have a little hoard of chocolate left over from Christmas which, so far, I haven't been tempted to touch. I am leaving it for my father and that day he got one of his favourites; "Turkish delight". From the beginning of our confinement both of us have been following a routine. We did it instinctively but I know it is crucial to getting through this long period of confinement. Lounging around all day in pyjamas or sleeping all day are not the way to go about it. So, we get up relatively early, have our breakfast, I write my blog, organise lunch, shower, etc, do some work if it is required or read. After lunch we watch the news, take a short nap and later go on our walk in the garden and come back inside feeling refreshed. Exercise is key too to survive confinement. Your government's restrictions rules may allow you out to exercise; not ours. I would beg you to do it at home, even if you live in a tiny flat. Then it's time to catch up with friends and family on the phone and read a bit until dinner. Making dinner together is the highlight of our day. We then go up to bed, watch the news and for entertainment we take refuge in Netflix or Amazon Prime. Our routine may sound boring but it is structured. The important thing is to follow a routine, whatever you choose it to be, stick to it, be organised and avoid going out. Our idea is to do enough shopping to last us 10 days at least and thus go out as little as possible. I would order food online but the service is practically non existent as demand increases. There are fruit and vegetable websites that deliver but they are way too expensive for us.
Oli, Miguel and Elliot were in Valencia in confinement of course and I imagine following their own routine. Miguel does things like press ups; good for him. He even does exercise, holding the baby and lifting it up as he goes from his haunches to his feet. The baby loves it. So his exercise is twofold: keeping fit and entertaining the baby hahahaha. To go out to work, employees now need a certificate from their employer which Miguel carries around with him everywhere when he is out. Olivia got one from RTVE to show she works in Madrid and lives at our address. We still don't need documents to prove we are shopping or whatever, but it may soon come to that. Oli sent us a picture of father and son which I have to share with you. The baby is so sweet.
 |
| Elliot with his father last Sunday in Valencia |
Oli ventured out that day to get some medicines for little Elliot and she took him with her on the 12 minute walk to the chemist. They both needed it. Miguel's only stray from home was to take the rubbish down to the communal dustbin. He did so wearing a mask, the mask given to him by his employer, RTVE.
 |
| Miguel taking out the rubbish with his mask on |
We didn't have a mask and when we saw the photo, we decided to get one each. Suzy had been urging us to get some and really I thought that when I next went shopping I should wear one. So, just before our "walk in the garden", there and then I ordered two of the apparently most effective type, the "FFP3" which is reusable at 18 euros each. It looked like they would be delivered by Amazon within 2 or 3 days but now I am told they may not be coming until the middle of April. Well, the truth is I was not surprised as there is such a high demand for them, especially for health workers.
We went on our 21 lap walk around the garden which takes about 45 minutes and again were followed by little Pippa. That amounts to about 4.5km, much shorter than our normal walk but better than doing nothing. The other dogs were not interested hahhaha. We came home feeling good after the exercise and fresh air. There was time before dinner for more contact with friends and family. I made a video call to Oli on whatsapp. At the same time Suzy was messaging her sister, so we decided to add participants to the call and included both Suzy and Eladio. It was our first video call as a whole family and it was such a laugh. We don't look great but we were in touch which was the important thing. Keeping in touch with friends and family becomes more and more necessary as we can no longer have physical contact beyond our own homes and we are all doing it the world around. Here we are during our call. Eladio had a lamp on above his head and it go us all laughing. It was a silly thing but set us all off and we were soon rolling around in stitches which did us all a lot of good. Here we are during the call with little Elliot in the call too.
 |
| Our family video call last Sunday |
The call was definitely the highlight of our day. Later I was in touch with other friends: Pernille in Denmark who is a nurse there and working with coronavirus patients, Kathy in the UK, Katty in New Zealand and nearer home, Irene, the daughter of what I consider my "Spanish family". That's the family I lived with in Madrid in the late 70's when I was studying Spanish.
Dinner was a healthy meal and we had a small portion of fish with asparagus. It's also important not to overeat during confinement as we are not moving much. Being at home for such a long period of time makes eating more food very tempting, and eating the wrong food at that. I am trying to be careful. If we are not careful, those of us with a tendency to put on weight will all come out of confinement with a few extra kilos or more and I don't want that. Entertainment in bed before falling asleep was the news and then two special programmes on the crisis we are experiencing. We can't get enough of it. I had tried to reduce the amount of news I take in but as I am a communications professional I can't keep away from it. But precisely because I am a communications professional I avoid fake news and make sure whatever I share is from a reliable source. It is estimated that 50% of content shared on social media is not. So be careful my friends and think before you share.
I think I must have fallen asleep at around midnight. On Monday morning I woke up to rain but that wasn't going to dampen my spirits. I was busy that morning working on a press release for my customer, Adamo, the Swedish fiber operator. There were a lot of people involved in giving feedback to my draft and so consensus would take a while. It kept me busy though for quite a few hours of the day and thus kept my mind off darker thoughts.
Elliot also helped to keep my mind off coronavirus. On Monday Oli sent us the latest photo of him smiling, completely oblivious to what is going on around him and in the world. No doubt when he is older he will learn about it in his school lessons - 2020 was the year of the coronavirus pandemic - but not for now. I loved the photo of our smiling little boy and shared it on social media to brighten up other people's lives too and take their minds off the crisis, if only for a moment. Oli and I both agreed it is one of the best pictures of him. Sandra, my dear friend in Brussels, commented; "there is nothing like a baby to make you forget". She is right.
It was on Monday that far away New Zealand with only about 100 cases, went into lockdown for 3 weeks. I'm glad they did that earlier than other governments. Figures soared everywhere and Madrid was still one of the main epicentres in the world with cases and deaths growing daily. There was grim news in the capital of hospitals not being able to cope, lack of equipment and ICU beds and of people lying around in A&E, some prostrate on the floor and some sitting on chairs waiting for up to 48 hours! Thankfully the army is playing a heroic role and not only making sure people are staying at home. They are doing the essential but dirty work of disinfecting hospitals, care homes, transport and even turning an exhibition centre into a hospital which will provide over 5000 beds. If in China it took 2 weeks to build a hospital, here in Madrid it took just 48 hours to turn an exhibition centre into one. Bravo I say.
There was a problem at the hospital that no one foresaw. With so many beds placed not next to walls, there were no plugs for patients to charge their phones, the only way of being in contact with their loved ones as no visitors are allowed. I was happy to read that employees of Telefónica came to the rescue later by providing 400 power banks. I hope they last or are replaced when they also run out of batteries.
That day, a whole team of soldiers disinfected care homes around the country and came across the most gruesome images anyone could imagine; dead and dying elderly people completely abandoned in their rooms as staff had fallen ill or just couldn't keep up. On Thursday we heard that over 900 elderly people had died in care homes in Madrid alone. The funeral services were not picking up the dead for lack of protection and because they just could not keep up with the numbers. Care home staff have been vilified the world round in the media. But they are not at fault as there is a protocol to follow once people have died. They cannot touch the bodies as they are contagious. Once someone dies, the staff have to alert the authorities. In these cases, they obviously did, but help was late in coming because of the sheer numbers funeral companies could not deal with. The main funeral companies in the capital that day had to announce they could not cope with the number of deaths as they had no protective clothing and would now only provide services for bodies of people who had died of other causes. Gosh! It was decided that day that the army would carry all dead bodies from then on to a big icing rink in the city centre until arrangements could be made. This doesn't bear thinking of but it happened and will continue to happen until after the virus peaks. No country or city is prepared for these numbers of cases and victims. Countries are prepared for war but not for pandemics as many virologists are telling us these days, virologists who have been warning governments for years that a pandemic is due. Well no one listened, it came and now we are where we are. I know I promised to be more positive from now on, but I can't ignore these facts. They have to be faced for when there is a next time because, these same virologists, are telling us this won't be the last virus to shake our worlds. The positive thing here though is that maybe we will be better prepared for the next pandemic as by then, hopefully, we will have learned our lesson.
We felt so safe at home but it does feel like being under house arrest even if it is for a good cause. It's amazing how people have accepted the curb on their movement rights which are a given in a democratic society. But that's because we all know why we are doing it. In the UK, Boris Johnson, had until that day preferred to leave the responsibility with the people but soon realised not everyone was being responsible. Thankfully by the end of last week he had abandoned his "herd immunity" strategy and was following the strategy of the rest of the world. He had shut schools, then pubs and restaurants, said over and over again that people must stay at home. But when the evidence showed they weren't he had no option than to announce lockdown in the UK too. It came in his daily TV announcement on Monday late in the evening. If when lockdown came in Spain it found a few thousand Spaniards trapped around the world, some on holiday, the figure of Britons abroad was estimated to be one million. They have also been ordered to come home which won't be easy.
Thus from Tuesday morning, the British public entered into a quarantine period of 3 weeks whereby they had to stay at home only venturing out for food shopping and to exercise once a day but keeping social distance. All non essential shops and businesses were to close down with people working from home whenever possible. Before this new mandate came, I had given advice to my dear friends, Kathy and Phil in Yorkshire, to get their sons to do their shopping and not to go out even for exercise. I had advised them weeks ago to stock up. Even so they had run out of white wine, the favourite drink of England's so-called "silent drinkers", a while ago and there is little in the supermarkets if any. I hope they keep safe as I hope everyone does. Good luck Great Britain. It must be far worse for South Africa which went into lock down later in the week. Restrictions there included a ban on the sale of alcohol and cigarettes. I can only imagine the scramble of people to stock up on these items or the possible flourishing of a black market.
We ended the day watching more of the Icelandic detective murder series; "The Valhalla Murders". It is the third most popular series on Netflix in Spain at the moment.
I was awake at 5.45 on Tuesday. I seem to sleep well from about midnight to 5.30 am and the only other sleep I get is a short nap or siesta after lunch. I do wish I could sleep more, both for my health and to make the days not quite so long.
As I have a routine, I keep quite busy. That day was different though as it was the first day I went shopping since we had been in Montrondo. I really didn't want to venture out but had no choice. Once at the wheel of my car, life began to seem normal, that is, until I got to Carrefour Market. It's difficult getting used to the new way of shopping; keeping a distance, queuing outside, only one person at a time at the till and of course the lack of some products. If in England there is a shortage of wine, toilet paper and now eggs, the issue here is with things like gloves - nowhere to be seen. Other things were missing too but I suppose we can live without them. It was worse at Mercadona where I do the bulk of my shopping. Again there were no gloves but also missing was freshly sliced ibérico ham (that hurts). I couldn't find oat bran which I have for porridge at breakfast and bought oat flour which tasted disgusting. Other things missing or lacking were cocoa, bread rolls and one could no longer slice loaves. I couldn't find Maltesers for my father so bought him a tablet of Lindt milk chocolate instead. Having to shop on my own and wanting to get enough provisions to last us, hopefully, 10 days, I had to fill 2 trolleys and felt bad about it as it looked like I was panic buying which I wasn't. What filled the trolley most though was fruit and vegetables of which we eat a lot. I bought as much as I could but you can't hoard perishable goods.
Everything took more time because of the new restrictions and distancing policies and I had heavy bags to load into my car without the usual help of my husband. As much as I could I kept trying not to touch my face. If I had to, I used my coat sleeve. That's another of the new challenges the coronavirus has brought to shopping. Usually I hate going out to do the weekly food shop and maybe I should have been glad to be able to get out of the house. Truth to tell, I didn't like the experience. It was ghastly. It's so strange to see people keeping their distance and wearing masks and gloves. It brings home all the pictures we see in the media and brings the crisis nearer. All I wanted to do was to get all we needed and be back within the safe walls of our house as soon as possible.
I just had to pop into the the chemist though before heading home and that was a new experience too. The new policy is one in and one out and those outside have to keep their distance in a long queue, everyone, except me, wearing a mask. Thankfully, people still talk to each other and I listened to the people in the queue giving their own opinion of the government's handling of the crisis as well as where it came from. Some people still think it was created on purpose for eugenics. God, no I thought. But in a way it is a natural form of this most terrible term as we see how the biggest percentage of those dying, here in Spain at least, is of men aged over 80.
Once home and before going in, I washed my hands and face in the garage sink. Later I removed all my clothes, washed again still feeling the fear of having ventured out into our brave and dreadful new world, only hoping I hadn't become infected.
On Tuesday the announcement finally came to postpone the Tokyo Olympics till next year. That made sense I thought. That day too, other countries announced confinement including India. India must be the most difficult country to put into lock down and with its nearly non existent health service and complete lack of food stores, there is only disaster facing its population of a staggering 1.339 billion, just 50 million below China, the country with the highest population in the world.
If Lombardy and Madrid were the epicentres of the world for the rise in cases and deaths, the US was catching up fast, especially the area of New York. Wow, that is the "city that never sleeps". I can only imagine its inhabitants can't sleep now for the fear of the virus which is spreading far faster than expected. When will this end I keep wondering? I am even wondering whether I will still be alive when it does end. Please stay away negative thoughts I kept saying to myself but sometimes it is not easy. It's good to keep calm but it's not good either to bottle up your fears.
What took my mind off the crisis after my bizarre shopping expedition, was making lunch. I had some salmon steaks in the freezer and looked up new recipes. One called "leeky salmon in a parcel" looked perfect as I had a few slightly dried up leeks left over from my shopping in Villablino. This was the recipe which I followed more or less to the letter, except that I used fresh dill instead of tarragon and I cooked it in the oven rather than in the microwave. I am not a fan of using the microwave for cooking. This was how it looked before I wrapped the parcels and put them in the oven.
The photo below is of the dish ready to be eaten. I have to say it was simple to make and it tasted delicious. It was good to find a new recipe to add to my rather repetitive list of dishes for lunch.
My father, being a great fan of dill, loved it. He loves dill so much, I think my parents used to grow it in plant pots in the porch in Bradford. I don't know much Russian but always remember it is called "ukrop", one of the few words I learned from my parents. My father is well aware of what is going on in the world, but as always, carries on as if nothing affects him, as he has always done, though no doubt he is worried for us and the world. Unfortunately, due to the crisis, he no longer has his English paper, The Daily Telegraphy, delivered at home and I cannot find a single English paper at the local kiosk. He is happy to read El País only then and resorts to lots of his old books. The other day I caught him reading Theodor Storm again. He also follows the news on his TV watching BBC World News every afternoon. Thankfully both tea and biscuits are still to be found and he enjoys a "cuppa" every afternoon, as do I.
The rest of the day panned out as usual, including our "walk in the garden", so vital to us keeping fit and well during confinement. I had some work to do tweaking the press release I would be sending out the next day and kept having my doubts as to the success of it being picked up by the press, all of whom are more or less only focused on the coronavirus crisis.
We finished watching the Valhalla Murders and started on a Swedish made series called "Kalifat" about Isis in Syria and the grooming of future Isis members in Sweden. It is very much a story of our times and right up our street.
I was awake at 5.30 on Wednesday morning. That morning we heard that Prince Charles has been tested positive. Thankfully he has not been in close contact with the Queen for some time. He was in Scotland at the time having gone to Balmoral for the confinement period and didn't seem to be badly affected. No doubt that new breed of people, the so-called "confinement shamers" will have had a good go at him, criticising him for having gone to his country home. Personally I think Balmoral must be a wonderful place to be, with or without Coranavirus.
I was busy most of the morning with work, but my mind was still on coronavirus. That day, sadly, Spain overtook China in its death toll, making it the second hardest hit country in the world after Italy in terms of the number of deaths. But can we really believe the numbers coming out of China with such a huge population? It doesn't make sense to me. We will never know. Also the low numbers in both France and Germany continue to puzzle me. I have heard that it maybe because they only count the number of deaths in hospitals and not in private homes or care homes. If they did count them, then, no doubt, their numbers would be higher up the league. In any case the numbers are just numbers but not exact as no one knows how many asymptomatic people there are out there and of course very few people have been tested.
It was good to have work to do to keep my distracted. It was on Wednesday morning at 11 am that I sent out the press release I had been working on it for my customer, Adamo, the Swedish fiber network operator whose main mission is to roll out their network in Spain's rural areas, often called "The Empty Spain". The news was that the company had raised 250 million euros to finance the expansion and growth of the company and its network and to reach 1.5 million homes at the end of this year. Between 3 and 4 million homes in Spain do not have access to fast internet. Thus the news was highly appreciated by the media. I had wondered if any notice of it would be taken at all, given that the news is so dominated by the coronavirus. Thus I was pleasantly surprised to see the our story published in the 3 main financial dailies as well as many other media, mainly thanks to the news wire agency, Europa Press. In all we got 20 clippings which I consider a huge success given the circumstances. As the clippings came through I tweeted each and every one of them, eager for the news to spread and it did. This, by the way, is the press release (in Spanish). The first article to be published was from Cinco Días/El País which gave me hope for more; and more there were. I was glad to see too that the media used our photo library on our press page to illustrate their articles, such as this one.
The news was good for the sector - more fast internet in rural areas - and for the company; its employees and partners. With so many companies going bust and people losing jobs because of the crisis, telco companies provide an essential service and will thus not just thrive, but grow too.
I spent most of the day on the watch out for news, no easy task in Spain where Google News is limited after some issue with the government and the media here a while ago. I would have to wait until the next day to get the full report from my press tracking agency.
Being in confinement gives you time to do many things. There had been some sort of campaign on Facebook for people to post photos of themselves when they were young. I think it was to counteract all the negative information we see and read constantly about coronavirus. It took a while to dig out a decent one of me as after all in those days few photos were taken. But I found one which I quite like, although I didn't when it was taken. I think it's an enlarged version of a photo I had taken professionally for documents I needed, either my passport or "residency in Spain when I first came to live here. I first came to live here a year after University, in 1981 when Eladio and I lived very secretly "in sin" as it was known those days because it was simply not done in Spain. We were very daring but, having come from England, I didn't worry at all, although we had to hide the fact from our neighbours who thought we were married. I must have been 24 when the photo was taken at a shop called "Simago" in Cuatro Caminos, a working class neighbourhood in Madrid near where we lived in "Saconia". We lived together until we got married in 1983 and our relationship became legal. Life was not easy for us. We had no money, nor a job and I had no residency papers or work permit. Eladio had just left the priesthood and none of his qualifications were valid outside the church. But we were in love, young and happy and had all our life ahead of us. If you had told me then that 40 years later or so, we would be in this terrible situation, virtually in the middle of a biological war, I would not have believed you. Franco had died and Spain had started to progress. Sex films were allowed and soon divorce. It's a very different Spain today, at the forefront of social progress. Seeing that photo took me right back to my beginnings in this adopted country, a wonderful country which is now so hardly hit by this terrible virus crisis and I mourn for all those dead and dying. I didn't take many photos this week as there is not much to take photographs of as we are confined and so again, the same as last week, I wanted to illustrate this blog with a more positive photo and there you have it; me aged 24. I hardly recognise myself. Someone commented they liked my eyebrows. Well at the time they were not in fashion and I didn't like them but now they are. Funny eh? Other people said I looked just like Suzy, my older daughter. Maybe they should have said that Suzy looked like me? The funny thing here is, that as her mother, I just don't see it, only in her gestures. As to the colour of my hair, well, most of you know me as a blonde but the reality is that my hair is dark blonde (probably white or grey now behind the dye). It may look a little red in the photo but it wasn't. I dread to think what my hair would look like without the blonde dye and am worried that as the hair salons are closed, what to do when the roots start to show. I bet a lot of women are worried about that too hahahaha.
I didn't take many photos this week, but when I saw Pippa, our miniature chocolate dachshund, lying in the sun in the garden that day, so oblivious to the crisis around us, I had to capture her on my camera. Bless her and thank God dogs don't get infected nor can they be contagious. Here is my little spoiled dachshund in the grass which, I reminded Eladio, needed mowing. But he is not listening. What he has been listening to a lot since confinement, is music. He has developed a passion for André Rieu's concerts. The Dutchman is both a violinist and conductor who is a worldwide success. I must listen to some of them too.
Elliot also helped to keep my mind off coronavirus. On Monday Oli sent us the latest photo of him smiling, completely oblivious to what is going on around him and in the world. No doubt when he is older he will learn about it in his school lessons - 2020 was the year of the coronavirus pandemic - but not for now. I loved the photo of our smiling little boy and shared it on social media to brighten up other people's lives too and take their minds off the crisis, if only for a moment. Oli and I both agreed it is one of the best pictures of him. Sandra, my dear friend in Brussels, commented; "there is nothing like a baby to make you forget". She is right.
 |
| Photos of our smiling baby brighten up our days |
 |
| The Ifema exhibition centre turned into a hospital with 5.500 beds |
That day, a whole team of soldiers disinfected care homes around the country and came across the most gruesome images anyone could imagine; dead and dying elderly people completely abandoned in their rooms as staff had fallen ill or just couldn't keep up. On Thursday we heard that over 900 elderly people had died in care homes in Madrid alone. The funeral services were not picking up the dead for lack of protection and because they just could not keep up with the numbers. Care home staff have been vilified the world round in the media. But they are not at fault as there is a protocol to follow once people have died. They cannot touch the bodies as they are contagious. Once someone dies, the staff have to alert the authorities. In these cases, they obviously did, but help was late in coming because of the sheer numbers funeral companies could not deal with. The main funeral companies in the capital that day had to announce they could not cope with the number of deaths as they had no protective clothing and would now only provide services for bodies of people who had died of other causes. Gosh! It was decided that day that the army would carry all dead bodies from then on to a big icing rink in the city centre until arrangements could be made. This doesn't bear thinking of but it happened and will continue to happen until after the virus peaks. No country or city is prepared for these numbers of cases and victims. Countries are prepared for war but not for pandemics as many virologists are telling us these days, virologists who have been warning governments for years that a pandemic is due. Well no one listened, it came and now we are where we are. I know I promised to be more positive from now on, but I can't ignore these facts. They have to be faced for when there is a next time because, these same virologists, are telling us this won't be the last virus to shake our worlds. The positive thing here though is that maybe we will be better prepared for the next pandemic as by then, hopefully, we will have learned our lesson.
We felt so safe at home but it does feel like being under house arrest even if it is for a good cause. It's amazing how people have accepted the curb on their movement rights which are a given in a democratic society. But that's because we all know why we are doing it. In the UK, Boris Johnson, had until that day preferred to leave the responsibility with the people but soon realised not everyone was being responsible. Thankfully by the end of last week he had abandoned his "herd immunity" strategy and was following the strategy of the rest of the world. He had shut schools, then pubs and restaurants, said over and over again that people must stay at home. But when the evidence showed they weren't he had no option than to announce lockdown in the UK too. It came in his daily TV announcement on Monday late in the evening. If when lockdown came in Spain it found a few thousand Spaniards trapped around the world, some on holiday, the figure of Britons abroad was estimated to be one million. They have also been ordered to come home which won't be easy.
 |
| A serious faced Boris Johnson announced lock down on Monday night this week |
We ended the day watching more of the Icelandic detective murder series; "The Valhalla Murders". It is the third most popular series on Netflix in Spain at the moment.
I was awake at 5.45 on Tuesday. I seem to sleep well from about midnight to 5.30 am and the only other sleep I get is a short nap or siesta after lunch. I do wish I could sleep more, both for my health and to make the days not quite so long.
As I have a routine, I keep quite busy. That day was different though as it was the first day I went shopping since we had been in Montrondo. I really didn't want to venture out but had no choice. Once at the wheel of my car, life began to seem normal, that is, until I got to Carrefour Market. It's difficult getting used to the new way of shopping; keeping a distance, queuing outside, only one person at a time at the till and of course the lack of some products. If in England there is a shortage of wine, toilet paper and now eggs, the issue here is with things like gloves - nowhere to be seen. Other things were missing too but I suppose we can live without them. It was worse at Mercadona where I do the bulk of my shopping. Again there were no gloves but also missing was freshly sliced ibérico ham (that hurts). I couldn't find oat bran which I have for porridge at breakfast and bought oat flour which tasted disgusting. Other things missing or lacking were cocoa, bread rolls and one could no longer slice loaves. I couldn't find Maltesers for my father so bought him a tablet of Lindt milk chocolate instead. Having to shop on my own and wanting to get enough provisions to last us, hopefully, 10 days, I had to fill 2 trolleys and felt bad about it as it looked like I was panic buying which I wasn't. What filled the trolley most though was fruit and vegetables of which we eat a lot. I bought as much as I could but you can't hoard perishable goods.
 |
| Most of the provisions I bought this week were made up of large quantities of fresh fruit and vegetables of which we eat a lot |
I just had to pop into the the chemist though before heading home and that was a new experience too. The new policy is one in and one out and those outside have to keep their distance in a long queue, everyone, except me, wearing a mask. Thankfully, people still talk to each other and I listened to the people in the queue giving their own opinion of the government's handling of the crisis as well as where it came from. Some people still think it was created on purpose for eugenics. God, no I thought. But in a way it is a natural form of this most terrible term as we see how the biggest percentage of those dying, here in Spain at least, is of men aged over 80.
Once home and before going in, I washed my hands and face in the garage sink. Later I removed all my clothes, washed again still feeling the fear of having ventured out into our brave and dreadful new world, only hoping I hadn't become infected.
On Tuesday the announcement finally came to postpone the Tokyo Olympics till next year. That made sense I thought. That day too, other countries announced confinement including India. India must be the most difficult country to put into lock down and with its nearly non existent health service and complete lack of food stores, there is only disaster facing its population of a staggering 1.339 billion, just 50 million below China, the country with the highest population in the world.
If Lombardy and Madrid were the epicentres of the world for the rise in cases and deaths, the US was catching up fast, especially the area of New York. Wow, that is the "city that never sleeps". I can only imagine its inhabitants can't sleep now for the fear of the virus which is spreading far faster than expected. When will this end I keep wondering? I am even wondering whether I will still be alive when it does end. Please stay away negative thoughts I kept saying to myself but sometimes it is not easy. It's good to keep calm but it's not good either to bottle up your fears.
What took my mind off the crisis after my bizarre shopping expedition, was making lunch. I had some salmon steaks in the freezer and looked up new recipes. One called "leeky salmon in a parcel" looked perfect as I had a few slightly dried up leeks left over from my shopping in Villablino. This was the recipe which I followed more or less to the letter, except that I used fresh dill instead of tarragon and I cooked it in the oven rather than in the microwave. I am not a fan of using the microwave for cooking. This was how it looked before I wrapped the parcels and put them in the oven.
 |
| Preparing the parcels |
 |
| The leeky salmon dish served with boiled potatoes |
The rest of the day panned out as usual, including our "walk in the garden", so vital to us keeping fit and well during confinement. I had some work to do tweaking the press release I would be sending out the next day and kept having my doubts as to the success of it being picked up by the press, all of whom are more or less only focused on the coronavirus crisis.
We finished watching the Valhalla Murders and started on a Swedish made series called "Kalifat" about Isis in Syria and the grooming of future Isis members in Sweden. It is very much a story of our times and right up our street.
I was awake at 5.30 on Wednesday morning. That morning we heard that Prince Charles has been tested positive. Thankfully he has not been in close contact with the Queen for some time. He was in Scotland at the time having gone to Balmoral for the confinement period and didn't seem to be badly affected. No doubt that new breed of people, the so-called "confinement shamers" will have had a good go at him, criticising him for having gone to his country home. Personally I think Balmoral must be a wonderful place to be, with or without Coranavirus.
I was busy most of the morning with work, but my mind was still on coronavirus. That day, sadly, Spain overtook China in its death toll, making it the second hardest hit country in the world after Italy in terms of the number of deaths. But can we really believe the numbers coming out of China with such a huge population? It doesn't make sense to me. We will never know. Also the low numbers in both France and Germany continue to puzzle me. I have heard that it maybe because they only count the number of deaths in hospitals and not in private homes or care homes. If they did count them, then, no doubt, their numbers would be higher up the league. In any case the numbers are just numbers but not exact as no one knows how many asymptomatic people there are out there and of course very few people have been tested.
It was good to have work to do to keep my distracted. It was on Wednesday morning at 11 am that I sent out the press release I had been working on it for my customer, Adamo, the Swedish fiber network operator whose main mission is to roll out their network in Spain's rural areas, often called "The Empty Spain". The news was that the company had raised 250 million euros to finance the expansion and growth of the company and its network and to reach 1.5 million homes at the end of this year. Between 3 and 4 million homes in Spain do not have access to fast internet. Thus the news was highly appreciated by the media. I had wondered if any notice of it would be taken at all, given that the news is so dominated by the coronavirus. Thus I was pleasantly surprised to see the our story published in the 3 main financial dailies as well as many other media, mainly thanks to the news wire agency, Europa Press. In all we got 20 clippings which I consider a huge success given the circumstances. As the clippings came through I tweeted each and every one of them, eager for the news to spread and it did. This, by the way, is the press release (in Spanish). The first article to be published was from Cinco Días/El País which gave me hope for more; and more there were. I was glad to see too that the media used our photo library on our press page to illustrate their articles, such as this one.
 |
| One of Adamo's photos from the library on our press page |
I spent most of the day on the watch out for news, no easy task in Spain where Google News is limited after some issue with the government and the media here a while ago. I would have to wait until the next day to get the full report from my press tracking agency.
Being in confinement gives you time to do many things. There had been some sort of campaign on Facebook for people to post photos of themselves when they were young. I think it was to counteract all the negative information we see and read constantly about coronavirus. It took a while to dig out a decent one of me as after all in those days few photos were taken. But I found one which I quite like, although I didn't when it was taken. I think it's an enlarged version of a photo I had taken professionally for documents I needed, either my passport or "residency in Spain when I first came to live here. I first came to live here a year after University, in 1981 when Eladio and I lived very secretly "in sin" as it was known those days because it was simply not done in Spain. We were very daring but, having come from England, I didn't worry at all, although we had to hide the fact from our neighbours who thought we were married. I must have been 24 when the photo was taken at a shop called "Simago" in Cuatro Caminos, a working class neighbourhood in Madrid near where we lived in "Saconia". We lived together until we got married in 1983 and our relationship became legal. Life was not easy for us. We had no money, nor a job and I had no residency papers or work permit. Eladio had just left the priesthood and none of his qualifications were valid outside the church. But we were in love, young and happy and had all our life ahead of us. If you had told me then that 40 years later or so, we would be in this terrible situation, virtually in the middle of a biological war, I would not have believed you. Franco had died and Spain had started to progress. Sex films were allowed and soon divorce. It's a very different Spain today, at the forefront of social progress. Seeing that photo took me right back to my beginnings in this adopted country, a wonderful country which is now so hardly hit by this terrible virus crisis and I mourn for all those dead and dying. I didn't take many photos this week as there is not much to take photographs of as we are confined and so again, the same as last week, I wanted to illustrate this blog with a more positive photo and there you have it; me aged 24. I hardly recognise myself. Someone commented they liked my eyebrows. Well at the time they were not in fashion and I didn't like them but now they are. Funny eh? Other people said I looked just like Suzy, my older daughter. Maybe they should have said that Suzy looked like me? The funny thing here is, that as her mother, I just don't see it, only in her gestures. As to the colour of my hair, well, most of you know me as a blonde but the reality is that my hair is dark blonde (probably white or grey now behind the dye). It may look a little red in the photo but it wasn't. I dread to think what my hair would look like without the blonde dye and am worried that as the hair salons are closed, what to do when the roots start to show. I bet a lot of women are worried about that too hahahaha.
I didn't take many photos this week, but when I saw Pippa, our miniature chocolate dachshund, lying in the sun in the garden that day, so oblivious to the crisis around us, I had to capture her on my camera. Bless her and thank God dogs don't get infected nor can they be contagious. Here is my little spoiled dachshund in the grass which, I reminded Eladio, needed mowing. But he is not listening. What he has been listening to a lot since confinement, is music. He has developed a passion for André Rieu's concerts. The Dutchman is both a violinist and conductor who is a worldwide success. I must listen to some of them too.
 |
| Pippa in our sunny garden on Wednesday oblivious to all that is going on |
Equally oblivious to the crisis is little Elliot, our 6 month old grandson who is in confinement in Valencia with his parents, our younger daughter, the TV journalist, Oli and her cameraman partner, Miguel. That morning she sent me a photo of him enjoying his food from a beaker.
 |
| Elliot on Wednesday with his beaker. Just look at those eyes! |
He loves his food and Oli warned me he has grown so much and is "massive" for his age. I'm worried he won't remember us when he next sees us. Thank God for photos and for video calls. They brighten up our days.
The rest of Wednesday was practically the same as all our other days of confinement except that that day I had a lot of work to do to keep my mind off things.
Eladio and I love our afternoon walk round the garden with Pippa - the other dogs think we are crazy. We also like making our dinner together and that night I made the same leek parcel recipe but with hake instead of salmon. It was also delicious. That night, after our dose of daily news on the coronavirus crisis, it was time for more episodes of Kalifat on Netflix. It is actually a bit scary but oh so real.
Thursday came and brought cold weather, sun and even a few drops of snow. Oh how I wish for the good weather as confinement would be far more pleasant with sunshine and warm temperatures. On Thursday I was busy again. I had to collect all the clippings from the press release and was happy to send them all to the people concerned in the company. I didn't expect any praise though and, as usual, didn't get any. I wonder if people realise just how difficult it is to garner media coverage on anything right now other than stories related to coronavirus?
Again that day I decided to cook something different for a change to add to my now growing repertoire of meals thanks to confinement. I made lamb tikka masala - a type of Indian curry. Apparently in the UK this dish has overtaken fish and chips as Britons' favourite meal. I well remember when curry first came to the UK. It was in Bradford in the early 70's when there was just one curry house in the town. Called The Kashmir, it was a favourite with my brother and I. Being next to the city morgue, there were lots of jokes about it. I remember there were just 3 items on the menu; vindaloo, madras and korma, vindaloo being the hottest of them all. My brother ate vindaloo and I ate korma. The meal was served with rice and chapatis, no cutlery and a large jug of water. That way I learned to eat curry with a chapati. Today naans are more popular but I always prefer chapatis. I also remember going at lunchtime when I was in the 6th form at St. Joseph's College. In the 6th form we were allowed to go into town for lunch. Once, a friend, Jacky Mosley - the daughter of Bryan Mosley who played Alf Roberts in Coronation Street - on our return to the 6th form common room, took off her sports' trousers and a cockroach fell out! The Kashmir was not a hygienic restaurant and in those days of course there was not much inspection of restaurant kitchens going on. To go with our tikka masala that day I dug out some naans I had in the deep freeze that I had forgotten about.
The news of the virus was once again dire that day. I read that in Holland and in Belgium doctors were telling old people who got infected not to go to the hospitals but to stay at home. They were virtually giving up on old people who would die in agony at home. That deeply upset me. South Africa announced lockdown too and put a ban on the sale of alcohol and tobacco. Stories too came out of India after the first day of confinement with pictures on television showing the police shooting at flouters of the law who didn't stay at home - maybe they didn't have one as there is so much poverty in India. In comparison, our confinement is very genteel and I count ourselves as privileged as we have such a big garden. The bad news in Spain apart from the non arrival of essential protective ware for hospital staff, was the arrival of a defect lot of virus tests. They will have to be sent back thus pushing back plans for mass testing. There was some good news to help cure the disease though and it comes in the form of a medicine usually used for malaria and lupus. Called "hydroxychloroquine", there is no proof it can help Covid-19 but has seen to be very effective in China. It was Donald Trump who spoke of it and as soon as he did, all the chemist shops in the US ran out of it. Here in Spain, inspired by hope, the Spanish government is buying large quantities of it but it will not be for sale in chemists which is a good move or it too will soon be unavailable.
While my curry was cooking, I took the time to ring Oli or rather video call her and was rewarded with seeing my dear grandson. I'm not sure he knows what is happening when we video call but I hope he does. At least though I get to see him. Oli goes back to work on 11th April and will be coming to Madrid with her family as their home is in Madrid and Miguel will be using his last month of paternity leave to look after Elliot. Their plan is to be here by 6th April, well after the self isolating period needed before they see us. I can't wait. Oli would have rushed here immediately after lockdown but Miguel had to work and she was worried she might infect us. Thankfully none of them have any symptoms at all.
It was just as we were finishing our delicious lunch that Amazon delivered a book I had ordered as well as a chocolate Easter egg by Lindt. In order to avoid contagion, Lucy picked both parcels up with gloves on and placed them on a garden table in our garage. I later went down with my gloves on and armed with scissors opened the parcels. I then removed my gloves, washed my hands and proceeded to clean the book and chocolate egg packaging with a warm soapy wettex. Only then did I open the parcels. I was disappointed with the £20 Lindt egg as it's tiny. As to the book, well it was "The 12th man: a WWII epic escape and endurance" by Astrid Karlsen Scott and Dr. Tore Haug, the book I had ordered for my father after seeing the film. The name of the "12th man" is Jan Baalsrud who I mentioned in one of my more recent posts. He is a national hero in Norway for his escape from the Nazis when he and his fellow soldier saboteurs landed in Norway. I knew the book would be of interest to my father as, as I have told you many times, he was part of the contribution of the Royal Navy in the liberation of Norway and spent a long time there after the war as a disarmament officer. As soon as I showed him the book, he said "Oh, Jan Baalsrud". So he did know. Later that afternoon he started reading it and told me he found it very interesting and that he knew a lot of the places and fjords in the north of the country where Baalsrud's heroic escape to neutral Sweden took place. I was so glad to have found something interesting for my father to read as that is his main occupation.
I had a good long siesta after lunch, sleeping from about 3 to 5 and was in much need of that extra 2 hours sleep. The day ended with one of the highlights - dinner. Both lunch and dinner and cooking our meals are my main activities of the day and what keep me sane during this crisis which is a nightmare for us all.
We finished watching the Swedish series Kalifat about Isis and Isis brides. It is a harrowing and very tense story and actually did me more bad than good when it was over. That night I just couldn't sleep. Eladio, unusually for him, couldn't either. I think it is at night while trying to fall asleep that I am at my most worried about the coronavirus. It is difficult not to worry although I try my hardest not to.
Friday came, the day we usually go out for dinner but of course that is out of the question now. It was our 13th day of confinement. I was up slightly later, at 7 am, as I had only fallen asleep at around 2.30 am. I was bushed to tell you the truth but felt a lot better after my delicious creamy and foamy Nespresso coffee. I just love my first cup of coffee in the morning. I ration my caffeine to that first cup, the other cup which I have for "eleveneses" is decaf.
I had trouble that day with my visa card again. I tried to buy another Easter egg from the British Corner Shop website and one on Amazon and was told payment was not going through. It took 3 calls to their customer service during the day to sort it out. Believe it or not my bank, Bankia, or the visa company had put out an alert for a possible fraudalent purchase when I tried to buy an Easter egg! It did the same when I tried to buy a box of kitchen gloves. This is the second time my card has been blocked and it was only at the end of the day that I found out it was even blocked for international online payments. What a waste of time.
While I was worrying about my bank card real worry was coming out of the UK when the news of Boris Johnson testing positive was announced. He announced it himself from Downing Street. Later in the day, the Health Secretary, Matt Hancock, also tested positive and the Chief Medical Officer, Chris Whitty, who was experiencing symptoms, went into self isolation. Thus the team leading the fight to stop the virus had all fallen prey to it, leaving the UK in a pretty worrying situation.
No doubt more members of the government will follow suit over the next few days. It's pretty obvious that Boris and his men, did not practice what they preached and did not stay at home. No doubt too, Boris' words when he told the public to be prepared to lose their loved ones to coronavirus will be resounding in his head. Remember his silly video about singing Happy Birthday to you while washing his hands? Well, he obviously didn't wash his much did he?The media have had a field day accusing the Prime Minister of failing to heed his own advice to the public on how to avoid and contain coronavirus. Thankfully for the UK, it seems the cases are mild, so good old BoJo will continue to lead the fight or so he says.
Thursday came and brought cold weather, sun and even a few drops of snow. Oh how I wish for the good weather as confinement would be far more pleasant with sunshine and warm temperatures. On Thursday I was busy again. I had to collect all the clippings from the press release and was happy to send them all to the people concerned in the company. I didn't expect any praise though and, as usual, didn't get any. I wonder if people realise just how difficult it is to garner media coverage on anything right now other than stories related to coronavirus?
Again that day I decided to cook something different for a change to add to my now growing repertoire of meals thanks to confinement. I made lamb tikka masala - a type of Indian curry. Apparently in the UK this dish has overtaken fish and chips as Britons' favourite meal. I well remember when curry first came to the UK. It was in Bradford in the early 70's when there was just one curry house in the town. Called The Kashmir, it was a favourite with my brother and I. Being next to the city morgue, there were lots of jokes about it. I remember there were just 3 items on the menu; vindaloo, madras and korma, vindaloo being the hottest of them all. My brother ate vindaloo and I ate korma. The meal was served with rice and chapatis, no cutlery and a large jug of water. That way I learned to eat curry with a chapati. Today naans are more popular but I always prefer chapatis. I also remember going at lunchtime when I was in the 6th form at St. Joseph's College. In the 6th form we were allowed to go into town for lunch. Once, a friend, Jacky Mosley - the daughter of Bryan Mosley who played Alf Roberts in Coronation Street - on our return to the 6th form common room, took off her sports' trousers and a cockroach fell out! The Kashmir was not a hygienic restaurant and in those days of course there was not much inspection of restaurant kitchens going on. To go with our tikka masala that day I dug out some naans I had in the deep freeze that I had forgotten about.
 |
| I made lamb tikka masala on Thursday to everyone's delight |
While my curry was cooking, I took the time to ring Oli or rather video call her and was rewarded with seeing my dear grandson. I'm not sure he knows what is happening when we video call but I hope he does. At least though I get to see him. Oli goes back to work on 11th April and will be coming to Madrid with her family as their home is in Madrid and Miguel will be using his last month of paternity leave to look after Elliot. Their plan is to be here by 6th April, well after the self isolating period needed before they see us. I can't wait. Oli would have rushed here immediately after lockdown but Miguel had to work and she was worried she might infect us. Thankfully none of them have any symptoms at all.
It was just as we were finishing our delicious lunch that Amazon delivered a book I had ordered as well as a chocolate Easter egg by Lindt. In order to avoid contagion, Lucy picked both parcels up with gloves on and placed them on a garden table in our garage. I later went down with my gloves on and armed with scissors opened the parcels. I then removed my gloves, washed my hands and proceeded to clean the book and chocolate egg packaging with a warm soapy wettex. Only then did I open the parcels. I was disappointed with the £20 Lindt egg as it's tiny. As to the book, well it was "The 12th man: a WWII epic escape and endurance" by Astrid Karlsen Scott and Dr. Tore Haug, the book I had ordered for my father after seeing the film. The name of the "12th man" is Jan Baalsrud who I mentioned in one of my more recent posts. He is a national hero in Norway for his escape from the Nazis when he and his fellow soldier saboteurs landed in Norway. I knew the book would be of interest to my father as, as I have told you many times, he was part of the contribution of the Royal Navy in the liberation of Norway and spent a long time there after the war as a disarmament officer. As soon as I showed him the book, he said "Oh, Jan Baalsrud". So he did know. Later that afternoon he started reading it and told me he found it very interesting and that he knew a lot of the places and fjords in the north of the country where Baalsrud's heroic escape to neutral Sweden took place. I was so glad to have found something interesting for my father to read as that is his main occupation.
I had a good long siesta after lunch, sleeping from about 3 to 5 and was in much need of that extra 2 hours sleep. The day ended with one of the highlights - dinner. Both lunch and dinner and cooking our meals are my main activities of the day and what keep me sane during this crisis which is a nightmare for us all.
We finished watching the Swedish series Kalifat about Isis and Isis brides. It is a harrowing and very tense story and actually did me more bad than good when it was over. That night I just couldn't sleep. Eladio, unusually for him, couldn't either. I think it is at night while trying to fall asleep that I am at my most worried about the coronavirus. It is difficult not to worry although I try my hardest not to.
Friday came, the day we usually go out for dinner but of course that is out of the question now. It was our 13th day of confinement. I was up slightly later, at 7 am, as I had only fallen asleep at around 2.30 am. I was bushed to tell you the truth but felt a lot better after my delicious creamy and foamy Nespresso coffee. I just love my first cup of coffee in the morning. I ration my caffeine to that first cup, the other cup which I have for "eleveneses" is decaf.
I had trouble that day with my visa card again. I tried to buy another Easter egg from the British Corner Shop website and one on Amazon and was told payment was not going through. It took 3 calls to their customer service during the day to sort it out. Believe it or not my bank, Bankia, or the visa company had put out an alert for a possible fraudalent purchase when I tried to buy an Easter egg! It did the same when I tried to buy a box of kitchen gloves. This is the second time my card has been blocked and it was only at the end of the day that I found out it was even blocked for international online payments. What a waste of time.
While I was worrying about my bank card real worry was coming out of the UK when the news of Boris Johnson testing positive was announced. He announced it himself from Downing Street. Later in the day, the Health Secretary, Matt Hancock, also tested positive and the Chief Medical Officer, Chris Whitty, who was experiencing symptoms, went into self isolation. Thus the team leading the fight to stop the virus had all fallen prey to it, leaving the UK in a pretty worrying situation.
 |
| The three men leading the team fighting coronavirus are now self isolating after the PM and Health Secretary tested positive this week. |
We, thankfully have heeded all the warnings and are symptom free. That day again I turned to cooking as my favourite confinement pastime. I made shepherd's pie for lunch, a dish I haven't made for years. I followed this recipe although this is a dish that is so simple to make it hardly needs one. My shepherds' pie looked like this when it came out of the oven and was delicious. For best results the dish should be made with lamb mince but that is hard to come by in this country so I made do with what I had in the freezer, a mix of beef and pork mince.
 |
| My shepherds' pie which I made for lunch on Friday |
Again I was in touch with my friends Adele and Sandra. It's a great comfort to be able to exchange our experiences of confinement in Spain, France and Belgium. We send each other all sorts of stuff on whatsapp. Well, on Friday, thanks to Adele I got to hear about a wonderful new music technology called "8d" which takes listening to music to another level. You begin to feel and hear the music from outside and all around you. Adele sent us an example by a group called Pentatonix. I loved the experience but not the song so much. If you haven't experienced 8d, then put your headphones on and just listen to this. Isn't it great? I later found more 8d music both on Spotify and on You Tube but little classical music I am afraid.
Eladio meanwhile was continuing watching and listening to Andre Rieu. He lent me his headphones to listen to a young girl called Amira singing O Mio Babbino Caro with the Dutch musician conducting. It was a very wow moment. This is the link. How come I had never heard of the opera singer, Amira Willighagen, who won Holland's Got Talent in 2013 aged just 9? Well I have now thanks to confinement. What a voice! Love her.
The day ended with us watching a new series on Netflix. Called Unorthodox, it is based, loosely I'm afraid, on a book I had read. Deborah Feldman, who left the Satmar Hasidic and ultra ultra Orthodox community she lived in in Willamsburg (Brooklyn New York), wrote a book about her experience called "Unorthodox: the scandalous rejection of my Hasidic roots". I had read it with great interest some time ago so was eager to watch the televised series of her story which Deborah had collaborated with. And what a story it is my friends. The fate of Satamar Hasidic Jewish women, in my mind, is akin in many aspects to the lives of the most repressed women we usually equate with fanatical Muslims. I am always fascinated with the stories of lives of repressed women possibly because it makes me appreciate just how privileged I am in a world which, although still dominated by men, can never ever compare to what some of our sisters in the world have to go through. Some of their lives are just not worth living as was Deborah's. Hers is one of the very few voices coming out of the Satmar Hasidic community and it is quite a shock to know that women in places like New York live that way. I'm sure many of them don't object as it is all they have ever known. They, like women in Afghanistan or Yemen, just accept their faith, few ever questioning it. Thank goodness Deborah Feldman did but at a very high price as you will find out if you read the book or see the series.
On Friday night I slept well and perhaps had the best night's sleep since confinement began. I was up at 7 am on Saturday morning and feeling so much better. Sleep too is vital to keep sane and more positive but that's my bête noire I'm afraid.
Friday was day 14 of confinement and pretty similar to all our other days. The highlight of the day was a Skype call with my dear friends Sandra and Adele just before our evening walk. Here we are chatting and trying to talk about other things than coronavirus. Sandra's first question to us was to ask for any non coronavirus related news hahahahaha. We spoke about the films and books we watched and read but of course we returned to what our lives are like in confinement. Here we are on screen.
 |
| Skype call with Adele and Sandie on Saturday |
After the call it was time for our walk. It was sunny but cold and we are in for more winter weather this week coming although it is supposed to be in spring. Oh well.
We had scheduled a video call at 8pm with the girls but Suzy let us down. She was having dinner with "her family" in London and they were later watching a film. Sometimes I think we are at the bottom of her list of priorities. Thankfully Oli, understanding I was a bit put out, gave me a ring from her confinement in Valencia.
It was Oli who later informed us that that evening the Spanish government would announce even more restrictions to lockdown. Later we watched an ever weary Pedro Sánchez, our Prime Minister, on TV speaking to the nation. His message was that from now on all non-essential workers must stay at home. What that means in economic terms for Spain is disastrous but then we have to choose between our jobs or our health. In effect all non essential work is to come to a halt in Spain. I'm not quite sure yet what the list of essential workers is but it is pretty obvious who they are, those providing basic services and essential work needed to curtail the virus. The list includes journalists like my daughter Oli who returns to work soon after maternity leave. The restriction is supposed to last two weeks but I'm sure it will be prolonged.
At midnight the clocks went forward one hour from winter time to summer time. This will give us one more hour of daylight in the evening, something I always love. Sunset here will now be at 8.37 pm. I just wish we could have some warmer weather to accompany the extra hour of light in the day. Soon, though, it has to come.
After these last words, I wish you all, wherever you are, strength to get you through this and to carry on because carry on we must. To carry on, we must remain positive and busy.
Till next week my friends,
Masha
No comments:
Post a Comment