After a long, corona-induced abstinence, I recently had the necessity to take to the skies again. Which also meant that after a good six months of pretty much avoiding all forms of public transit, I also had to take a taxi, a streetcar, a train, and a bus all in short order. The last time I flew was at the start of the pandemic and the airports were ghost towns, but because of Business As Usual, this was no longer the case and I thought it would be interesting to look back and see what we’ve learned over the past 15 months.
(Again, there might be some debate as to whether this blog entry really deals with admin or not. Many of the decisions certainly look like they came from admin and I’m sure that admin had to sign off on most of them. So, we’ll call it a push and simply move on, which, as we shall see, can be very unwise these days.)
From the outside, it looked like things were being taken seriously. Online check-in was partially disabled insofar as one could check in, but the actual boarding cards could only be picked up at the airport counter after having presented a negative corona test that was taken in the last 48 hours. And, during boarding, we were all duly instructed to maintain social distancing for our own Comfort and Safety, which we all duly did in our little travel groups. (One of which comprised about 10 Chinese people in full hazmat suits.) The plane was also loaded from back to front to minimize interactions and jostling. (This is actually the way it should always be, at least for (German) efficiency reasons. But, for some reason, American airline companies like to board the planes from front to back and not just because the real paying customers are up front.)
From the inside, however, it was a different story and social distancing stopped at the door of the aircraft. Because the flight was full, my neighbours were as uncomfortably close to me as normal and there were no empty seats to be found except those purposely left empty in business class. Thanks to the pandemic, “social distancing” has somehow become yet another commodity for the airlines to sell for profit.
(But, I guess that blatant, desperate piece of commerce is especially important on those little tiny planes where the expensive perks of business class really only amount to metal utensils and glass cups. This essential lack of any difference was made painfully clear on this last flight, where the “barrier” between business and economy was a little curtain that could be clipped and unclipped to the overhead bins as need be. After we had all taken our seats, the cabin crew realized that they’d set the curtain one row too far back and so moved it up, causing one of the people who was now suddenly to be ignored behind the curtain to memorably quip “Gee! I guess we’re not in business class anymore.” (Yes! Not one, but two obscure Wizard of Oz references in the same sentence!))
After two hours of unsocial distancing, we were advised upon landing to remain seated because the plane would be progressively emptied by rows. Again, all for our Comfort and Safety. All good, if not a pleasant relief from the normal rugby scrum and flying elbows that usually ensue once the seatbelt light goes off. All good, that is, until we were all packed solid into the transit bus that took us to the terminal building. Comfortable? No. Safe? Definitely not as much as it could have been with a little more effort and thought. And, another bus …
(As an uncharacteristic aside, I’ve never understood why the airlines insist on maintaining their boarding procedure when there is a bus involved to take you to the plane. Seriously. What advantage do business-class passengers get through their “priority boarding” except to be first on the bus and thus last on the plane?)
The balance sheet? In looking back, the only real accommodations made for the pandemic during this whole process (apart from always having to wear our masks) were during boarding and leaving the plane. Everything else was pretty much as it always has been. Apparently, people become dangerously more infectious when they’re moving, something that Eurovision 2021 recently also made sure to account for. After a year’s hiatus, the cross-continental kitsch contest was back and with 3500 live, guaranteed corona-free spectators. As long as they were in their seats, these lucky few could go without masks (the pandemic’s equivalent of going topless, I suppose), but once they started moving around the arena, the masks went back on, even with those negative corona tests.
(In saying all this, let’s be absolutely clear about two things. First, I love Eurovision. Second, I have no time for anti-vaxxers or pandemic deniers. If these people want to shorten their lifespans by defending their right to not wear a mask or to not get vaccinated, that’s fine. Just don’t shorten mine and be sure to stay off the sidewalks when I defend my right to drive my car wherever I want. (Kudos to my dad for that last little bit of sarcasm.) The coronavirus is real and so is the pandemic and vaccination works. Period.)
And, given that common sense is unfortunately not so widely distributed as the name would suggest (on that bus ride to the airport, it happened not once, but twice that a person took the seat directly behind me on a virtually empty bus), we do need the authorities to help us along. I also understand why their responses to this once-in-a-lifetime pandemic tend to be of the seat-of-your-pants, we-really-don’t-know-what’s-going-on variety. But can’t there be a little bit more consistency? Or at least a little less lip service?
Just recently in the Spring of 2021, Germany resorted to an even harder hard lockdown in worst-hit places to combat the Third Wave of the pandemic. One of the measures included a curfew from 10 in the evening to 5 in the morning. No one was allowed out on the streets during this time except those who could prove that they were going to or from work or that it was some sort of emergency. Or (and, as always, I am not making this up) were simply jogging or out for a stroll, which everyone could do until midnight because, as we all know, these activities represent basic, unalienable human rights. (Although highly dangerous ones given the apparently increased infectivity of the coronavirus with movement.) Not sure if I could take my dog out for a pee during the curfew, even if it might represent an emergency to her, but I could presumably take her for a stroll around the block until midnight, albeit on a 1.5-m long leash.
Shopping is another case in point. All stores required masks and social distancing. Makes perfect sense. But, for some stores, that was it. Others, however, required any or all of a negative corona test not older than 24 hours or evidence of either a full vaccination or a full recovery from the virus. (And, considering that the slow rollout of the vaccine in Germany was partly to blame for the hard(er) lockdown, it was often a toss up if the second or third condition was the more likely of the two.) Still others required that you made out an appointment in advance on top of all this.
It’s not that these measures are necessarily bad. (Annoying, yes. Helpful, definitely.) It’s just how they were seemingly so randomly implemented. If the negative corona test was 25 hours old, your shopping options became limited. You could still board a plane and sit 1.5 cm away from someone for several hours, but you couldn’t come into many stores for even five minutes while staying 1.5 m away from everyone to buy those overpriced mini-toiletry items for your carry-on luggage. If the test was positive, it didn’t mean anything unless it was a PCR test, making you wonder just how safe all those negative results really are. Grocery stores, which are habitually full, only required masks. Clothing stores, which habitually are not, required everything. Electronic stores, somewhere in the middle.
(Now there are, of course, those who will argue that groceries, unlike clothes, represent a basic human need. Like jogging or strolling until midnight. However, except perhaps for some Walmartians, you can’t go shopping for food with just a mask on. Think about that.)
(Now try to unthink that …)
Masks are a must for everyone, except small children. But, as anyone who has had small children knows, kindergartens and grade schools are the real-world equivalent of Petri dishes for every form of disease, pestilence, and bodily fluid known to humanity. And, if there is any segment of society that actually enjoys wearing a mask, this is it. Just tell them that it’s all a game of cops ‘n’ robbers or secret agents or superheros or something and they’ll probably fall asleep at night still wearing the damn things.
The list, of course, goes on and on. Germany has thoughtfully provided a Corona Hotline for people to call. But only during working hours from Monday to Friday and then only until noon on Friday because we all know that no one gets infected outside of normal admin working times. Which, in turn, makes you question the effectiveness of the curfew because it clearly falls within those times when corona is not infectious. Even if you are moving at the time …
But, in the end, the flight did have a nice Throwback Thursday touch to it: real boarding cards! So, for those who are counting, that makes me old enough to remember them, but young enough to not be confused by their smart-phone equivalents.
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