Happy Christmas?

 

 

Today marks the real institutionalisation of the pandemic.  I had to show my Covid Certificate or Passport to get into the swimming pool.

     There was the usual failure of the technology when it turned out that the image of my scrambled digital thingy on my mobile phone (you can tell that I have forgotten what they are called) was too small to be read by the mobile phone app that was being used to check entry.  For some reason the phone did not allow me to expand the image to make things easier for the desk staff, but eventually I was allowed in.

     Last night on the television there was a piece on the long lines of people in the centre of Barcelona who had just realized that their access to bars, restaurants and gyms was going to be ended if they could not produce a valid covid certificate, and so they were desperately queuing to get their jabs.  I suppose that one should think, “Better late than never”, but one can’t quite rid oneself of the bone deep irritation that one feels when thinking about the sheer inconsideration of people who can’t give a hoot for the general good until it impacts on them directly.

     In the armed forces, I remember reading from years ago (and had it confirmed by my Dad) if you suffered from sun burn, it was considered an offence as the ‘injury’ was ‘self-inflicted’.  I feel very much the same from those people now clogging up precious hospital beds, where the vast majority of Covid patients in ICUs are unvaccinated!

     I don’t remember the same degree of vaccine avoidance about other fatal diseases and feel that the political edge given to Covid vaccine reluctance is one left over from the disastrous ‘presidency’ of Trump. 

     His macho idiocy and cavalier attitude towards disease prevention is directly responsible for deaths.  For anyone else you would ask yourself how the hell he manages to sleep at night knowing the damage he has done to families and to institutions – but with such a sociopathic narcissist like himself, where he is the centre of his own sick universe, he is able to redefine responsibility and ignore so-called collateral damage.

     In Catalonia, I take the requirement to show that you are vaccinated to be a clear sign that our government is taking things seriously. 

     Yes, there are contradictions contained in what we understand to be the new rules for socialising and, as things stand at the moment, I will be able to go to my next opera in the Liceu with almost full capacity.  I assume that we will be asked to show a Covid certificate for entry there too, but I have yet to be informed by the House, and the performance is only a week or so away.

     I do understand that, as a retired person, I can afford to take a fairly purist attitude towards restrictions: I do not have to commute, my financial wellbeing is not connected (directly) to the health of any one firm or place of work in the UK, I can afford to be complacent, in so far as my pension is from the government and not from any public company.  Yes, the ability of governments to pay their pensioners is directly dependent on the wealth of the country providing them, and the restrictions on people being able to work has lessened the tax money that the government can spend, but we are still protected in a more direct way than a self-employed actor, or waiter, or salesperson.

     Christmas is the time when some industries make a chunk of their earnings: the Panto season in theatres is essential to the health of the theatre for the coming year; restaurants look to party bookings during this period as a guaranteed source of income to see them through the leaner times in the year.  All computation about what will and will not happen financially has been thrown into disarray by the pandemic.  Nothing is certain.  Rules change on a weekly basis.  Long term confidence is something of a dream.

     Those lucky enough to be on a combination of full, state, and professional pensions are assured of a fixed payment each month.  For the majority of the working population the pandemic has shown how privileged this financial state is as what previously had been thought to be guaranteed proved itself to be not as firmly grounded as hoped.

     I do understand that keeping the economy going is of essential importance, pensions are, after all, paid by the contributions of those still working – but there is also the question of the health and safety of the nation to be taken into consideration too.

     In the UK at the moment, there are wildly differing approaches depending on who you listen to in Government about what you can consider doing this Christmas.  John Crace (the Guardian Political Sketch Writer, and well worth reading) is fond of using the image of Schrodinger’s Cat to illustrate some of the contradictory attitude of government.  Johnson seems to have abdicated responsibility for giving clear advice about what to do this Christmas apart from saying that Christmas Parties should not be cancelled, but he still harps on about personal responsibility where what he is doing is off-loading the burden of accountability on to some sort of mythical inner logician that we all have inside us, that will allow him to claim that any increase in deaths because of faulty precautions taken will be the responsibility of those who die and not the person who has the title of Prime Minister and who should be leading us.

     The corruption, lies, deaths, incompetence, bullying, hypocrisy, and cowardice of this twelve-year-old government makes the “Thirteen years of Tory misrule” proclaimed by Wilson in 1964 look positively prim by comparison!

     Here in Catalonia, we have a government where the equivalent of the Conservatives has little power, but there is a limit to what can be done when the parties we do have are squabbling amongst themselves and hardly living up to the names of the political sections they are supposed to represent.

     Politics seems to be becoming murkier by the month and adds nothing to the confidence with which we can look forward to Christmas and the next year.

     I fear that the imposition of Covid passports is just a step in the process of softening us up to accept far more stringent restrictions when the full import of the growth of the Omicron variant is clear.

     “Happy Christmas” is a fond hope, not a greeting.

LOCKDOWN CASTELLDEFELS - DAY 7

The first week completed; I would feel some sort of sense of achievement, if it wasn’t for the information that this is likely to be the first week of months of lockdown to come.

     We were first told that this Draconian form of self-isolation would last until the end of March.  My school said that lessons would probably resume on the 30^th of March.  People were geared up for a couple of weeks of ‘hardship’ before something approaching pre-virus normality was restored.  That now seems like a fond, self-deluding fantasy.  Some people have talked of a whole year of confinement!

     Although we have been told not to expect a vaccine for at least a year or more, we can look forward to some sort of treatment for the virus in a very much shorter time.  This may be metaphorically putting out the fire rather than ensuring that the fire never starts, but it is better than nothing.  If things go according to plan we ‘at risk’ group should be able to look forward to some sort of augmented flue jab by the autumn and some sort of treatment if we are actually infected and, who knows, perhaps a vaccine in short order too!

     But what will be the real costs of this pandemic extending through spring, summer and into the autumn?  Taking the worst of the PIGS (Portugal, Italy, Greece, Spain) group of countries first, what exactly is going to happen to Greece?  Economically Greece is the basket case of Europe, and it was before the virus, so where does that place it now?  And Italy?  After (and during) the extended disaster of the virus on the country what is going to be left on which to build?  Portugal was a frail economy, what adjective can describe it now?  All of Spain’s hotels are closed, the tourist trade is dead; restaurants, bars and shops closed: how are they going to recover? And when does the recovery process start?

     From a personal point of view, I am one of those lucky buggers to have been able to retire at an age when I could take full advantage of an income-linked pension.  Even when I started to draw my pension, the government was belatedly panicking about how to pay it in the future.  The raising of the pension age was a (belatedly) desperate decision to put off the day of reckoning when the sums finally would have to be worked out.  A shrinking working population supporting a growing population of pensioners simply doesn’t work.  What those ‘sums’ are going to be like when this crisis is finally over is not something which makes me feel confident about my future finances.

     ‘Confidence’ and ‘Fairness’ are two key words to bear in mind when thinking about the short and long term consequences of the virus.  As with payment of pensioners, there will be questions about payment of workers who, because of the self-isolation policy, not working.  The government will be paying out and not getting anything like enough coming in to pay for it all.  OK, the interest rates on available money are almost insultingly low, so governments can borrow at more than attractive rates – but that money eventually has to be paid back.  It will be hardly surprising if people start to question the apportioning of scarce wealth in the coming months, and difficult questions will be asked about those to whom the limited wealth is given.

     Our politicians are fond of using war imagery during crises, and in Britain there is often an appeal to some sort of mythical national characteristic that is at its best in times of threat.  The appeal to ‘The Spirit of the Blitz’, the cheerful resignation, the make do and mend, the we can take it syndrome that will see us ‘muddle though’ and allow us to look back on national catastrophes with a wry smile and a slightly disbelieving shake of the head.  That’s the fantasy.

     The reality is supermarket shelves stripped bare as the outward sign of the vicious selfishness that is a far clearer marker for ‘national character’ than any of the mythic positive qualities of the past.  The ignoring of government recommendations to stay at home, to close pubs and clubs, to avoid travel and all the other ‘suggestions’ that the Blond Buffoon’s government were too cowardly to make into instructions when they were needed.

     British people, we have been told, have flocked to the seaside, are still gathering in dangerous groups, a still having a drink are still, in other words, doing all those selfish things that ensure the spread of the virus.  Modern Britain is generally, a glaring reflection of the selfish negativity that gave us the Brexit vote.

     I know that this negativity does not apply to the whole population.  My cousin in London has said that she has been overwhelmed by the number of emails and offers of help that she has received, that her street has an active and positive on line group that ensures that people in the at-risk group are never alone.  There will always be good people doing the right thing, but with a virus, all it takes is a tiny minority of irresponsible people to create havoc – and the minorities are hard at work doing exactly that in Britain today.

My walk around the pool was a more social event than it has been over the last few days.  This time, there was a fellow walker – not I rush to add in the same area as I, but in the next door’s tennis court, safely apart from our pool.  A young lady, with earphones securely inserted walking with brisk purpose around the court, their pool and back again.  We gave each other a quick, smiled “¡Hola!” as we passed.  I was waved to by two of our neighbours who leaned out from first floor living room windows.  But, if more people follow my example and perambulate around the pool, then I will stop doing it, the risks will increase and I will be confined to the third floor terrace.  That should be no problem, as we have been informed that someone has run a full marathon on a 7m balcony!  Where there is a will there is a way.

     But I do not think that the will is that strong.  Already you can see signs of ‘fraying’ as people buck against the unnatural confinement.  People want out!  And who is going to stop them?  And that is where I see the real problems lie.

     Talking to a friend in Britain, he said, “There will be riots in three weeks, if this keeps up!”   People will not be confined, and it will take police and the armed forces to keep them in place.  I think that social unrest is almost inevitable.  I was shocked to learn that in northern Italy people are not keeping to the strict restraints of quarantine.  In northern Italy the most toxic centre of the virus in Europe!  50,000 people turned up to see the Olympic Flame in Japan!  What part of contagion do these people not understand?  If rules continue to be flouted what is left for government, but enforcement?  And then god help us all!

Well, having thoroughly depressed myself, I will now turn to something a little more uplifting.  Um . . . ur . . . um . . .

I joined the MOOC (Massive Open On-line Course) with a university in Madrid looking at a series of paintings from the Renaissance to the death of Goya. (European Paintings; from Leonardo to Rembrandt to Goya – Universidad Carlos III de Madrid)  Although the course is ‘free’ there is a massive attempt to get you to pay $50 to have an augmented experience and be able to do the multiple answer ‘exams’ and to get a certificate at the end of the course.  The course is in English and it comprises a series of short videos and an on-line forum.

     I have looked at the first few videos for the course and, as far as they go, they are fine and dandy and aimed fairly squarely at those with little or no experience of art history: they are an engaging introduction and there is a standard choice of artists to consider.  I will ‘follow’ the course, but I’m not sure that I will learn a great deal, but there is much to be said for revision!  And I am looking at other courses that will be more stretching, and I have already found one on Modernism that looks promising!

A reminder that drafts of my new poems are available on my blog smrnewpoems.blogspot.com