Thursday 14 May 2020 marked the day that New Zealand moved away from a lockdown and a managed return to normality. Actually it was 23:59 the day before but let’s not lose any sleep over one minute. Which, coincidentally that’s exactly what a number of people will have experienced whilst they were waiting for their barbers to open. Yes one such establishment wasted no time and opened their doors at exactly one minute to midnight and welcomed in the great unshaven for a trim and a tidy. Well, probably more than a trim. Hopefully they didn’t charge by the kilo of hair removed.
Exactly how well managed our return to normality will be depends, in most part, on the good people of New Zealand. From Thursday offices reopened, restaurants invited customers back into the premises and shops opened their doors once again to people. Not bars though. They have to wait until next week. But once they’re open, the only thing that will remains closed entirely will be our border. That will remain firmly shut for the foreseeable future other than to those hardy souls who want to be quarantined for two weeks at a government managed facility.
The odd thing is that we won’t know how well the managed return is being managed for at least another two weeks. That’s the frustrating thing with viruses - they lurk about before deciding to show their faces. But so far, everything looks encouraging. Last week New Zealand recorded three days in a row with zero new cases and this period, again due to the annoying lag of the incubation period, relates to the time we moved out of full lockdown and into Level 3. For those keeping score, our new cases for the last week have been 3, 0, 0, 0, 1, 0, and today 1.
Being allowed to roam again is a very odd feeling and I’m not sure I like it. I knew where I was with being told to stay home and save lives. Part of me wants to stay locked up and out of the way but another part, who hasn’t been seen for eight weeks, wants to get out and about and see stuff. Not that it took much persuasion to get me to the pub on Thursday night.
“Shall we go and check out The Lumsden?”
“But what if there’s too many people there?”
“Don’t you want a pint?”
“I’ll get my wallet!”
I needn’t have worried, the pub was following the Government’s guidelines explicitly. As we approached the bar, we were greeted and shown to our table - thankfully it was a glorious autumn Auckland evening so we could sit outside - and asked to scan the QR code on the table. This immediately brought up a web page where we could enter our details should we need to be contacted. Menus were brought out and beer was served. Very civilised. If the result of the lockdown is that table service is finally brought to pubs in New Zealand, then I won’t be complaining.
One of the many odd things about New Zealand is that it adopted queueing at the bar to get drinks. “Ah, but that’s what we do in the UK” I hear you mumble. Well yes, except we actually queue in New Zealand. It’s not unusual to see a long line of people snaking around the bar lounge waiting to be served. In the summer, during one of the many long weekends we have at that time of the year, we visited Russel in The Bay of Islands, and popped to the local bar for a beer or two. Unfortunately there was also a wedding party there at the same time so we were met with a huge queue - it wasn’t quite out of the door and into the street but it was close. With no other option, we joined the end of the queue and quietly waited as we inched our way towards the bar. In most part is was extremely well behaved but inevitably there were some locals who thought they deserved to be served first. As we got chatting to the people around us in the queue, the discussion took its usual turn. Where were we from? How long had we been in New Zealand? How long were we staying?Why did we live in Auckland when we could be living somewhere nicer like Russel? How on earth do we cope with the traffic congestion? Did we know that Auckland wasn’t really New Zealand? Wasn’t everything more expensive in Auckland? I was just about to launch into my usual speech about how Auckland keeps the New Zealand economy moving and without us New Zealand would struggle to function when I finally reached the front of the queue. Saved by the bell...or to be more precise the beer tap. Queuing is better than the scrum that occurs in many UK establishments but table service would be a small sliver of light in these dark times.
I digress. Apologies. So for the first time in months we sat in the open air, sipping our beer and waiting for food to arrive. It was a great feeling to be finally out and about again. For us the lockdown hasn’t been too difficult but I know that won’t have been the case for many. Some will have lost jobs, seen their income disappear, spent each day working from their bedrooms, lived in fear of physical abuse or even lost loved ones. Its been tough on the nation but hopefully the effort has paid off. It really is now up to us. Keep to the rules, be vigilant and take care of one another.
It is, of course, entirely possible for things to move in the wrong direction. Just as we have seen in China and Singapore, reopening the economy is a risky business and it just takes one person to trigger an outbreak. Then, as fast as you can say “well that’s disappointing” we’ll be back in our bubbles. But, fingers crossed, the lockdown is over and bubbles are bursting all over Aotearoa. for the last time
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