HERE WE GO AGAIN: DAY 1, New ‘Lockdown’, FRIDAY.
It’s just as well that I went to the Opera on my birthday as I have just been informed via email that the next opera performance due on the 24th of November, has been ‘postponed’ – as it is a concert performance of a juvenile Mozart opera composed when he was 14, I cannot say that I am devastated by the delay! I am prepared to do some YouTube musical ‘homework’ to make its three-and-a-half hours of straight singing tolerable, as I find that even a slight acquaintanceship with the music of operas, I don’t know gives me a partial key to their enjoyment in performance!
At least there are always tunes in Mozart, and I do remember that I had a much-played record of music by Mozart written when he was in London at the age of 12, and that was intimidatingly excellent, so an opera composed after two long years of extra maturity from that music does demand attention!
After all, given Mozart’s short life, a Mozartian Year must be very different from those lived by mere musical mortals who tum-ti-tum along to the tunes!
The State of Emergency in Spain has been extended into next year in Parliament, so we are now in the ‘New new-normal’ as the restrictions get more and different. At present we are under curfew (10pm-6am) with bars and restaurants closed. As of today, those restrictions stay in place, but other closures have been added which include larger stores, shopping centres, places of entertainment like Opera Houses, and gymnasia, which includes my swimming pool. There are further restrictions on movement with heightened restrictions during the weekend.
This morning, for example, I could not go for my usual swim, but I was able to go for my normal bike ride which extends the length of the paso along the coast of Castelldefels. At the southern limit of the city it actually extends into the jurisdiction of Sitges. There was no problem about that today, but on Saturday and Sunday I will be restricted from completing the final length as Sitges will be out of bounds.
We also live on the ‘border’ with Gava to the north and tomorrow the stretch of the paseo along the Gava coast will also be out of bounds. In the previous lockdowns there were police stationed at the invisible borders of our town to enforce the ban.
There will also be police on the approach roads to the beach part of Castelldefels as the weekends are usually the time when people from Barcelona city come to visit. Gava and Castelldefels are the coastal resorts of choice for the city dwellers and the police are going to have their work cut out if they are going to try and stop all of the visitors that we are likely to have.
Obviously, all this inconvenience is designed to stop the spread of the virus, but all of the measures are going to be pointless if the general population doesn’t get behind the restrictions.
Since February we have been subject to a bewildering array of instructions, some of which seem to be ‘arbitrary’ to put it mildly. We are constantly told that proximity is the most important factor in the spread of Covid and yet schools are still open. Buses are still running, as is the Metro and the train system. Shops have limits, but most shops now do not have dedicated assistants restricting entry.
The “if this, then why not that” approach to instructions is making following them difficult, and the shameful dinner of 150 politicians and the assorted Good and Great, is a calculated spit in the face of the ordinary joe trying to follow the rules where for us gatherings of more than 6, and closed bars and restaurants are the norm. The Minister for Health was one of the attendees at this rule-breaking gathering, giving yet another example of “One rule for us another for them” approach to governing. And yet, with breath-taking hypocrisy these discredited chancer politicians still appear on the TV and in Parliament giving voice to rules that they do not follow themselves.
I’ve now been told, or rather I’ve been “I thinked” by Toni that my bike ride tomorrow on Saturday is OK because I am going to adjoining municipality and that is allowed. But certainty? None. I will try it out tomorrow and when I am stopped by the police, I will know the limits to my activity.
As I didn’t have a swim this morning, I went out on a second bike ride taking the Gava paseo as my route. It was pleasantly empty with only a few hardy walkers and riders. One even hardier gentleman was sunbathing on the beach. The sun is out, but there is a sea breeze that tells you that you are in the month of October, and towards the end of that month as well. But ‘Bravo!’ for a stronger determination that even I have to keep summer alive – my continued wearing of T-shirt, shorts and sandals seems positively overdressed compared to the nakedness of the beach devotee!
The situation in the UK appears to be getting even worse than it is here. The piecemeal tiered approach is more geared to commercial concerns than human ones; the projections for British deaths over the winter is horrific; the government is a sick joke. But perhaps I am being unfair. My country of Wales seems to have taken difficult but hopefully effective drastic measures, as have the other constituent nations of the UK, with the signal exception of England. I fear that Johnson and his third-raters in the Conservative Party put politics and survival of their ‘brand’ above the human cost of failed policies. And just to make my cynical misery complete the fiscal here in Spain has archived or shelved any criminal action against the ex-king in relation to his shady dealing and less than honest behaviour. It makes you weep. That same disgraced ex-king once famously proclaimed that, “Justice is the same for everybody!” How hollow that sounds today as he skulks away in some undemocratic eastern kingdom. What a shower of shits our ‘ruling’ classes are!
Still, any day at the end of October in which anyone can even think about divesting themselves of clothing and sunbathing next to the Med, has to be positive.
Long live the sun!
