Saturday, February 1, 2020

The virus in our minds


I do my bit to contribute to the globe’s environmental pollution. I fly a lot. Every year, a few trips across the pond to see the offspring and at least two to India to see the moms and other aging relatives. Other than that business trips, as needed. This time I am on an unscheduled trip to India. But I picked a day when all airlines were in a tizzy with the spectre of the coronavirus looming large. A co-worker returned to Canada last night with vivid accounts of the mass exodus of travellers from China. He said people had bookings on multiple airlines to guarantee a safe extraction! On his flight, Air Marshals hovered over passengers to bark at them if their face masks came off, except while eating. So I could not have picked a more inopportune date for travel - what with airlines bailing out on flights to China precisely from January 31, 2020.

However, the real story is not the virus itself but the anxiety it has stoked in the populace at large. Last night our flight was grounded owing to a “technical snag” ( read - the domino effect of the “virus” resulting in overworked staff and overwhelmed airline). Today, we are flying but, other than the super resilient Indian crowd at the Etihad line, the airport is eerily empty. There was no one when I passed through security, the duty free shops looked like abandoned relics of a past era and the lounge I was in had 5 people in all. I was armed with masks, having bought in to the paranoia but decided not to wear one since I did not want to set off any alarmed looks.

Hollywood could not have dreamed up a more devious plot to entertain and sizzle. A virus from eating bats triggers a global health emergency - sounds oddly familiar?? Is this the case of the tail wagging the dog? Another distraction story perpetrated by the Americans? A ploy to destroy the Chinese economy or to boost real estate prices in Canada, as this will no doubt trigger some serious emigration out of China? All these are of course figments of my overactive and agitated mind. I am a product of my time, that lives off social media fodder. We have gone loopy. Our problems are more imagined than real. JK says it best even though he lived and died before whatsapp and facebook took over our lives!

https://www.instagram.com/p/B2Gqb3OnapU/?igshid=ei1jj26com49

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