Love in the time of Corona – early days
As the first case of Coronavirus was confirmed in KZN, we cancelled plans for a sexual and reproductive health awards ceremony that required flying in people from 10 countries. That weekend, I travelled to Zimbabwe – for a party – not knowing it would be the last time we were allowed to leave the country for nearly two years.
I had asked ahead if there was anything I should bring that was in short supply. Bacardi, they said, CBD oil and printer cartridges. No one asked for hand sanitiser or masks. A heavy duty orange mask was pressed into my hand as I left for the airport. I thought I would wait until I went through security to see if officials or fellow travelers were wearing masks. They were not and I felt the lurid face covering with black ventilators was more likely to trigger a stroke or an evacuation than prevent an infection. So I kept it in my bag, with the sticky mints, the broken pen and the dirty tissues.
I was impressed with the infection prevention measures at Harare. Everyone was sprayed with hand sanitiser and had their temperatures checked as we disembarked. Then we were questioned about where we had travelled from.
‘South Africa’ I say. ‘Where?’ asks an official with a mask.
‘Durban’ I reply.
[Fellow passengers step back].
‘Is that in KZN?’ asks the official.
‘Yes.’
[Fellow passengers gasp and step back again]
‘What were you doing there?’
‘I live there.’
[‘Spray her again!’ yells a fellow passenger.](Laughing stage left)
‘Go there!’ orders the official.
I go to a desk far from the queue, to complete a form that asks about my flight and seat number, my movements over the past 21 days. There is a list of symptoms. Of course I am going to answer ‘No’ to all of them but I hesitate at ‘Irritable and confused’.
I hand in the form, I’m directed to the ‘Diplomats’ passport check, collect my bag – and hug and kiss the friends waiting to collect me.
Past the queues for fuel, around the potholes, beside the stone sculpture workshops, the private schools and the roadside nurseries, into a suburb of frangipani, guava and avocado.
Party preparations are in full swing. The hosts order in Ethiopian food for the guests who are sleeping over. We dig into injera and beyainatu. Some people are vocal about the absence of inyama. No one complains that we have arrived from many countries and are moving our many hands between mouth and communal dish.
Image descriptions: Above, a line of 20-plus cars, lorries and pick-up trucks queuing for fuel in Harare, seen through the windscreen of a 4×4. Below, a woman with an afro hairstyle, dressed in a 1970s style striped satin pantsuit, dancing with others at a poolside decorated with balloons.
In the morning we combine old traditions with new precautions.
Gifts are handed over. We discuss our histories, trajectories and multi-cultural connections over these 30 years, in a (post)colonial garden.
There is a Happy Birthday banner, a table for cake and gifts. Meanwhile, buckets are placed near the gate so that guests will wash their hands before entering.
And I, desperate to be useful, request a task. I am given balloons – pearl and purple – to inflate. So I start, blowing my KZN breath into these plastic bubbles. And then I stop. ‘You know, I can’t think of anything more irresponsible to do at the moment.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Well, filling balloons with my breath and spittle – I am from KZN you know. Imagine if a balloon pops, and if I have the virus I could infect everyone in 10 seconds!’
Laughter.
‘But it won’t and you don’t!’
Guests arrive. They wash their hands. We discuss recommended ways of greeting – nodding, namaste, foot bumps. I think foot bumps are potentially fatal – drunk people balancing on one leg next to a swimming pool in the dark, really? Just wash your hands.
Alors on danse. And we dress up like in the 70s. Angela Davis, Samuel L Jackson in the house. We drink. We dance. We find the reasons we are in the same space, connected by two friends from different continents.
We tell our stories, we exchange the hurt and the confusion of decades. When we leave, we hug and promise.
Back at the airport, I am invited into an almost empty duty-free shop, urged to buy a 200,000 Zimbabwe dollar note for USD1 – ‘a souvenir of hyper-inflation’.
No one sprays me, because I am leaving I suppose.
Arriving at OR Tambo international airport in Johannesburg, there are now dispensers of hand sanitiser on every wall, with posters explaining how to protect yourself against COVID-19.
Everyone is tired and has their hands full. We walk on by. We hold the handrails and the trolleys. We hug the people who meet us.
I listen to the radio in the car. ‘Every year, 10000 people die of ordinary flu in South Africa’, says the person from the Institute for Communicable Diseases. ‘And no one says anything’.
I arrive home. My child has a headache. He gets undressed. He has a bottle of hand sanitiser in each pocket of the trousers he drops on the floor. He falls asleep. I hold him and think of all the ways we love and die.
12 March 2020
