Diaries from the Quarantine - I

This is the eight day of quarantine for me.

Exactly one week ago, on Monday 9th of March, as everybody knows by now, the whole country of Italy was declared a red zone. This extraordinary measure was taken only two days after the centre of the epidemic, the northern region of Lombardy, had been closed down in the same way. In the following day more restricting measures were adopted to stop the virus from spreading as fast.

In less than a month, our country was completely taken by the disease and our day-by-day life disrupted. When the first patient (patient 1) was taken ill to the hospital and the diagnosis of COVID-19 was confirmed, panic slowly started to creep into our mind.

As always in our recent history, Italians started a witch hunt. Those who were blamed (or still are) were, in order: individuals seemingly not following the government instructions to self-quarantine when coming back from China, then scientists who kept sending alarming messages to the country, then the government was taking the issue too seriously, damaging the economy, then the government was not doing enough, then people not following the lockdown rules, then the European Union was not doing enough, then other countries weren't, and so on. You get the picture. 

Italians are very good at complaining without giving any input to better things. We like to feel as a nation when our soccer team wins a game or when something like a national emergency happens, but then we go back fighting over which traditional regional recipe is the best or muttering under our breath against the government - it doesn't matter if people sitting in the government were actually elected by the majority of the voting country, nobody will admit voting for them, when asked. We are a country full of contradictions, some of which are funny, some are not. 

Personally speaking, I am not sure if anything could have been done differently or in a better way. Everyone is good at criticizing when things are done, but taking actions and decisions - in this case, for a whole country and for the world - is never easy. I myself likely underestimated the epidemic and the virus at the beginning, believing that we would not find ourselves in the same situation as China. We like to think that epidemics, devastating seasonal weather phenomena, people dying of childbirth or famine are things of the past - at least in the Western world - but they are still very real. COVID-19 and climate change - which is still happening, and to which this epidemic might be linked - are a much needed reminder that Earth's actions are still dictating our lives. 

What I am sure about is that our country example can be the difference between millions of deaths or a relatively small number of casualties due to COVID-19. As I am writing (16th of March, 2020) the death toll is up to more than 6.000 worldwide, and many other countries around Europe and the world are applying similar measures to ours to lower the contagiousness of the virus. Europe might come out of it before Summertime, but who knows what is going to happen in other continents. 

One week ago, I took my last stroll in Rome historical city centre, unaware that the next day the lockdown for the whole country would have been announced. Since then, I left the house twice to go grocery shopping, and that's it. These have been seven long days - not because I have been home the whole time (we jokingly say that some people like me, who have been through periods of isolation due to depression, anxiety, loneliness or passion for videogames and Netflix, have been preparing for quarantine their whole life) but because they have been emotionally challenging. Two weeks ago it would have been unthinkable that our President of the Republic Sergio Mattarella would publicly scold Christine Lagarde, our Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte would have a fanclub of young women and we would only meet our neighbours on the balcony, singing traditional songs. I will write more about this in the next posts, because this quarantine has been really surprising and there are so many anthropological interesting things going on. 

In the past twenty days, the part of the country where I am living led a relatively normal life. We were, of course, more careful about hands hygene, we listened to horrific stories coming from the north but we kept on going out, eating at restaurants, hanging out with friends. The epidemic was there, in the back of our mind, but it still seemed to be something far away, that would not affect us. Then, at one point, everything changed. Day after day, we got worse and worse news, lockdowns were institutionalized in parts of the country, ad then we were in lockdown as well. Before, I had the chance to think about something else for most of the day, as I was still working; now that I am home and where I live is in lockdown as well, I cannot think about anything else. 

And there is more: my hometown is in the centre of the red zone (as we call the area most affected at the moment). My whole family is there, my friends are there. I know people who got it and/or are looking after relatives who are hospitalized. I had already decided not to visit my parents before the lockdown started, as travelling already seemed risky, and since the lockdown has been implemented going back there seems more and more difficult by the day. Many people, like me, are stuck away from home and families, and decided not to travel back in order to diminish the risk of contagion for themselves and for others; unfortunately, many more didn't. This is why it is likely there will be an increase of cases in southern Italy, where, tragically, there are not as many hospitals and ICU beds as there are in the north.

Being in quarantine without work to do leaves you a lot of time to think, as there are only a limited number of corners in the house that need intensive clean ups. Talking with many people who live abroad, and seeing how the Italian case have been reported online and by media, I realized people are fascinated by what is going on here, and they often don't understand why some measures have been adopted or they complain when they are applied in their country as well. Considering how emotionally tough this moment is being for me, I had already decided I wanted to write some sort of journal; I then decided to do it online, here on my blog, and I also decided to write it in English because I would like it to reach as many people as possible - to warn them, to make them understand what is happening, to leave a memory of this weird, surreal experience we are going through.

Our grandparents and parents lived through WWII and the Cold War; my generation, despite going through 9/11 and an economic crisis, still lacked a global, unifying traumatic experience. We are now going through it.

Be safe, be healthy, and if you feel anxious or scared remember: you are not alone. Many people are going through this, and many will listen to you. I certainly will.

'Till next entry,

Liliam

Ronda. July 2018.