“By the end of the first week of quarantine, emotions started running high.
There were various rules put in place and they had to be followed. Keeping social distance was top on the list. The second was personal hygiene and lastly, self-responsibility, which meant discipline.
But by the end of the first week, these rules seemed hard to follow. People in a confined space are hard to contain. Survival becomes the only priority.
We soon realized that while queuing is a must, the one-meter distance in a small confined space is difficult to keep.
Yet breaking it equates to indiscipline and punishment! How are over 142 people in quarantine supposed to do that and remain sane?
The other is personal hygiene. People in isolation are expected to wash hands, sanitize and rinse their hands while there is hardly any soap or sanitizer?
We had all arrived from the airport and not our homes — we were not prepared for life in quarantine. I was escaping the Madrid chaos and didn’t make plans for the 14-day quarantine.
We didn’t know where to take our grievances, but we had to survive, somehow, and remain sane while at it.
NO M-PESA
There was no way of avoiding contact with the other high-risk arrivals. How would you and yet you have to borrow soap, buckets to wash clothes and cups?
Women needed sanitary towels and had to knock doors to seek help. There were no specific rooms or blocks to differentiate males from females. We were all mixed up. Yet discipline was expected. How now?
Anyway, as I said earlier, this was not a picnic camp and we had to get that into our traumatized heads.
On the first day, we had discovered a tiny kiosk, those M-Pesa boxes. But it was closed the next day — dealing with our contaminated cash was treated as a risk to other “clean” Kenyans out there. One had to figure out how to get their personal effects from outside.
More so, we still had our money in foreign currency. I remember a guy from Mombasa who was in a dilemma on how to send cash to his family. He had dollars.
No cash in M-Pesa. So he was going around requesting anyone who would take his dollars and send him the equivalent amount through M-Pesa.
Would he really do that from a metre away – unless he shouts? Do your math. Self-discipline can’t be observed by people in such a situation.
And who knew the current exchange rate anyway. We had no newspaper or TV to watch business updates. But he finally got help.
BE HUMBLE
By the end of the week, we had to silently agree that quarantine was in many ways a concentration camp or mad house to say the least!
But this didn’t mean that one should take a chance with the government or the powers that be.
The security guards are very powerful. You have to obey their orders. The cleaners too. If you need anything from the “free world”, you have to be nice to the cleaners; otherwise, you will be cut out.
That person scrubbing the toilet is the most important person here. You send him or her some M-Pesa so you can get that special milk or Sensodyne toothpaste you’re so used to.
Luckily, the cleaners are so kind. When you send them money, you send an equivalent as “withdrawal” fee. That is how it works.
As I came to realise, life is a piece of drama. It can change. No one knows tomorrow. And in some situations, only God can save you.
It is here I confirmed that His mercies endure forever. At a personal level, I did not want to take chances with the authorities and Covid-19.
I had made a decision to earn my certificate after the 14 days. I really wanted the clean bill of health certificate!
INCOME DISRUPTED
How easy would that be while the place was full of stressed youngsters? Apparently, they hadn’t planned for this kind of homecoming.
They worked in service companies in various countries and they had no choice but to leave. They were in hotels, schools and taxi businesses – all of which had closed.
They couldn’t continue footing the bills without any income. They had paid exorbitant amounts for their tickets to come home.
They had very little hope after this. Some had their visas expiring in a short while. Others had only arrived in their various workstations hardly two months prior to the coronavirus crisis.
Everyone had a story. Stressed. And nobody cared about their mental anguish. I was wondering: how would these people keep social distance yet they were quarantined with friends they worked and jumped fences with to get back home?
They were on the same plane, at the same airport and were later piled onto an overloaded NYS bus! Seriously? It was going to be a tough place to be.
Amidst all that though, I still had to keep sane and sound nice when my children called. But for how long? My concern was maintaining good health.
At least my appetite was building up slowly. I watched my friend who hadn’t agreed to eat yet and feared for her health.
I couldn’t offer any spiritual or mental help. I was still a wreck in that area.