Arguing in Coronavirus Isolation - Expat in Kaliningrad, Russia

Diary of a Self-isolator: Day 74 [1 June 2020]

If we must argue, there’s always coronavirus

Published: 1 June 2020

Have you ever found yourself embroiled in an argument when you are not quite sure what the argument is about?

This is what is happening with us. If it is not a result of being cooped up together in coronavirus lockdown, then it might possibly be another of those mystery symptoms of coronavirus itself.

My wife, Olga’s, stance has always been one of ‘I can’t understand this virus … how does it work that some countries have such a high rate of infection and others don’t? From this position, the question evolves into ‘how is it that countries that are practising isolation, lockdown and social distancing often have more cases, and more serious cases, of coronavirus than those who deviate from the assumed correct procedures (inevitably, given its geographical location, the first example of such deviation has to be Belarus ~ where the trend has been bucked, where life goes on much the same but the stated incidence of coronavirus is relatively small).

Then there are questions relating to the ever-changing, never constant miscellany of theories, suppositions, and half-truths (perhaps sprinkled with one or two no-truths) thrown at us by the world’s media. These questions revolve around the inconstancy, which inevitably becomes the contradictory, and before you can say mass vaccination, we are off down the slippery slope into the sink of conspiracy.

Let’s move on.

In Russia, as with almost every other part of Europe, the trend has been towards a relaxation or easing of the social distancing rules and associated limitations widely acknowledged as restricting or slowing the spread of Covid-19 based on a day-by-day assessment of risks and the trade-off between those risks, ie the chances of contracting the virus, loss of quality of life and the good of the economy.

Here, the strategies adopted vary from region to region depending on circumstances specific to each region ~ Russia is a big country, so this makes sense ~ and it is up to those in charge of each region to decide whether to lift certain restrictions, persist with them or even, if the situation warrants it, increase them.

So far so good, but the sticking point for my good lady is that in the Kaliningrad region mask wearing, so she informs me, is compulsory on the streets, and of this she is most skeptical.

My get-out clause is that as I travel only from A to B (A being the house and B the shop) rather than to all the other letters of the alphabet, wearing a mask as I stride along the cobbles is not insupportable. Like her, I do not much care for it, as I do not have a demister for my sunglasses, and I, too, am not entirely convinced that masks do more good than harm ~ is a sweaty face a magnet for coro? And the next time you are out and about see how many people are fiddling with their mask, thus touching their face with their fingers and hands, and how many times, for no apparent reason than just because you are wearing a mask, you feel the instinctive need to scratch your nose!

On the efficacy of this imperative it would seem Olga and I find common ground, but where we diverge pointedly is in her accumulative insistence that ‘something funny is going on’ in the world, that is the world of coronavirus. In the all-encompassing, claustrophobic world of coronavirus, this is a constant bone of contention, which is unfortunate if you are, like me, vegetarian, but her main problem ~ apart from me ~ is that she is incapable of accepting that as this is a new virus the situation is an evolving one and that our politicians’, health specialists’ and scientists’ opinions, and it follows their strategies, are subject to revision as and when new circumstances come to light.

The continual race by the world’s media to be the first to report it, does not help. Invariably, some media organisations seem to be one jump ahead of themselves, do not have all the facts or deliberately misinform, the name of this age-old game to sell newspapers and also nowadays to get you to click on their online feeds to satisfy their advertisers.

With their help, and not a little assistance by Facebook Fannies, Olga has stumbled so far into Conspiracy Mire that she has arrived at the most unenviable point, the point of no return. It is a dark and misty place. But wait, who is that ahead of her? Can it be? Could it be? Indeed, it is that man ~ the man who wants to vaccinate the world. Why? Because he wants to chip us all!

Arguing in Coronavirus Isolation ~ will we all be chipped? — THERE IS A CONSPIRACY THEORY THAT THEY ARE GOING TO CHIP ALL OF US!!
(Photo credit: Frank Vincentz – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=17942659)

In the words of an old song, ‘Oh, can it be that it was all so simple then‘. What happened to the days when the only chips we had to worry about was the fatty-fry much-lardy kind that came soaked in vinegar and wrapped in newspaper?

With cholesterol, sorry, I mean coronavirus, is it plainly a case of having your chips and eating them? Stay safe but not at any price?

In those moments when we least understand each other, and there have been one or two over the past 20 years, my wife alludes to the difference between the Russian and English mindset. Apparently, the British populace are all too willing to play by the book. They are told to do something, and they do it. I did not like to draw her attention to what I consider to be the Skegness syndrome, namely that at the beginning of the lockdown rules a good proportion of British folk flouted them, preferring a day in Skegness (and other places, no doubt) and to hell with the pandemic. And that, only a couple of days ago, over the Bank Holiday period, hundreds were packing their suntan oil and tinnies for the pleasures of Brighton beach.

I am, of course, aware of a recent article on RT headlined Almost quarter of Russians believe coronavirus is fictional, according to new study¹ and note this comment, which appeared at the end of an article about Russians still being interested in foreign holidays: “This is the mentality of Russians — they don’t give up².”

As I said to my wife, I am not surrendering yet, but where coronavirus is concerned, whatever your suspicions or beliefs, as my old mate Falstaff said when we last had a pint together in the days when Wetherspoon were allowed to open, ‘Discretion is the better part of valor’.

References
¹https://www.rt.com/russia/489996-quarter-russians-believe-coronavirus-fictional/ [accessed 31 May 2020]

²https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2020/05/29/russia-wants-to-spark-a-domestic-tourism-boom-will-it-work-a70411 [accessed 31 May 2020]