Sanjee Goonetilake
I come from Galle, a city with a small-town feeling in Southern Sri Lanka. I currently live in Brussels, Belgium with my Belgian husband and our two children. I left Sri Lanka in January 1994, to study for a Bachelor of Arts in International Relations and Diplomacy at an International University in Madrid, Spain. Since then, I have lived more than half of my life outside Sri Lanka.
In the first week of March, as Belgium had its first cases, I noted that Sri Lanka also started reporting its first cases. I started keeping a diary. I started writing social media posts advocating early stringent measures giving numbers of what was happening in Italy. I was deeply frustrated at the inaction in Belgium and the rest of Europe in the early days, and I wanted the rest of the world to act fast when the first cases appeared. I was criticised by some of my Scandinavian friends, who told me that I was no expert to tell the rest of the world what I noted.
While I could have flown to Sri Lanka in the first week of March, I decided to put aside my personal feelings of visiting my mother. I simply could not travel with the risk of being an asymptomatic carrier and endangering the health of my mother and others. Sri Lanka had quarantine laws for Italy, South Korea and Iran.
It is then that I asked several of my Sri Lankan friends, how come we do not see any cases in Sri Lanka in the Johns Hopkins metre. Like I had considered, there must be other Sri Lankans from Europe who must be going home, especially from the huge diaspora community in Italy who could fly from any other destination instead of Italy as Europe had open borders.I wrote to my friends connected to the Sri Lankan government, asking if we could consider shutting down all flights arriving in Sri Lanka from all these countries and not specific countries. I am glad to say, I was heard and I gradually saw the list of quarantine countries increasing and eventually closing down of the flights.
In the meanwhile, my friends in Namibia and Guatemala informed me that with very few cases they had all gone for early lockdown. My social media “hysteria” had worked, and some places in the world were watching Europe and following the numbers to minute detail.
Last weekend, we completed five weeks since we went for lockdown in Belgium. Belgian style lockdown is based on the right to individual freedom. This means rules are flexible. All essential businesses remain open (food and medicine) and all other sectors are closed to the public except for online orders. Restaurants and coffee shops are closed. One can only leave home for buying essential goods, to do exercise (for example walking or cycling) only in the maximum company of two (friends keeping social distance), or in the company of a family living in one home. One cannot leave one’s municipality and one cannot leave the country.
In the meanwhile, I note far too many people in the streets especially in the parks and in the walking paths doing “sport”. There is a strong desire to do sport now that the weather is sunnier and because one cannot handle being inside. You hardly see police officers or military checking on people. Belgium has always had a shortage of police officers in the capital, Brussels.
Belgium has a population of 11.46 million inhabitants. Currently, Belgium has 38 496 Covid 19 cases on 19 April. The number of deaths is at 5683. Belgian authorities say that this high number of deaths is due to the fact that deaths in the elderly homes are counted without having tested for Covid 19 cases, while in many other countries only those who died at the hospital are counted as Covid 19 cases. Today, Belgium has become the country with the highest death rate per capita in the world.
It should be noted that in Belgium if one has Covid 19 symptoms, one has to call the General practitioner (house doctor). The house doctor decides on the telephone if it is a serious case or not. Generally, the person suspected of having symptoms is asked to stay at home for 14 days and self-quarantine. One gets tested only if one is sick enough to be hospitalized. This means the actual number of cases in Belgium is much higher than the 38 496 cases which are tested when hospitalized. I am personally aware of many cases of people who have not been tested and who have been asked to stay at home.
As Belgian numbers rise as in the rest of Europe, most Europeans evade talking of our collective grief. I grieve every day for the elderly and the vulnerable who die in Europe, and I find solace in reading the Sri Lankan social media which reflect my feelings. The number of deaths in Belgium has simply become a number, and it breaks my heart to see these deaths classified as just another number. While most people are probably sad, no one wishes to talk about it and I hear from Europeans coming from countries where there are relaxed measures, that it is only the elderly who die. These kinds of comments make me feel deeply sad about what we have become as a society, with all this progress. There is a lack of community feeling and people tend to still think of finishing deadlines and hoping that the schools and work will start within a week. Currently, everyone is speaking about “exit strategies”.
I see denial everywhere, and within that denial, I see fear and the unwillingness to face the inevitable painful reality that we are going to see a lot of deaths. The youth in many of these countries tend to complain of being forced to stay at home and I see a clear lack of resilience. And adults, perhaps because they have not lived a crisis themselves, do not see this lack of resilience as a weakness. It is a revelation to me that I have, despite all my travels, understood what resilience is, because of my youth in the late eighties in Sri Lanka.
1987/1988 were probably one of the worst periods in history for me living in the South of Sri Lanka. I remember living in Galle and my father had started a private hospital just a few years before that. I was 15 years old. There was a curfew imposed by the government and also curfew from the JVP (a Maoist nationalist movement). When the JVP put the curfew we were not allowed to have lights on or watch tv. The entire city was in darkness. When the government put the curfew on, the shops and the city were locked down. In a nutshell: we had no food. My father was not allowed to accept patients by the order of the JVP curfew.
One must wear a black band on the arm to show respect to the JVP. If someone did not comply with the JVP curfew, that person was shot. I remember the death of our neighbour who had kept his shop open in the JVP curfew time. We heard the gunshots at night. And the crying of the family. My father was obliged to keep all the staff on and keep paying salaries. He sold most of his assets to continue the business. Our car, too. We barely could buy any food – and food was scarce anyway. I remember having a picnic in the hospital premises with the nurses, eating Breadfruit (Del), chilli sambal and scraped coconut. The Breadfruit was from a big tree in the parking lot of the hospital. We finished it off with a cup of plain tea. There was a lot of solidarity. Food was scarce, and we had small parties with neighbours eating Jackfruit (Kos), Manioc (Cassava) from the street or Breadfruit ( Del). Rice was a rare commodity.
During one year, we had no school with on and off-breaks. We saw a lot of deaths and killings. Injustice was a part of life. But all those who lived it, remember our Galle days as an era of hardship and resilience. This is what unites the youth of my time in Galle: the grit we nurtured in that period. One day, all of us will look back at this period of Corona with the same grit and same resilience.
I went to the supermarket in Brussels this week after five weeks of being at home. My husband has been doing the groceries since the lockdown started. You are allowed in after waiting, and only a few customers are allowed inside. I saw fear in the eyes of the staff when I went near them for sanitizer and for the shopping cart. One customer shouted at me “keep your distance” when I was at the vegetable section and she was three metres away from me. However, no one is wearing a mask and if you wear one, the general attitude is that you are exaggerating. The culture of wearing a mask is considered typically “Asian”, and it is considered that masks only protect the “infected” from not infecting others. However, while 80 per cent of the infected are asymptomatic, wearing the masks are not encouraged as there was a shortage of masks for the front line workers. I rarely see anyone wearing a mask when exercising outdoors. Perhaps this situation may change as we move towards exit strategies.
When I ask my friends why we cannot have more stringent measures looking at the increased numbers, I am told that the government will not take measures which will infringe on individual liberties. Even control of mobile phone data on movement is considered an invasion of privacy. I am also informed that a massive number of people need to die, for stricter actions to be taken.
However, I look forward to one event every day. Here in Belgium every evening at 8 pm, we clap together with our neighbours in honour of the health care workers and all the workers in the front line. Then my son Sarnath plays Beethoven’s Ode to Joy on Recorder. My daughter Ahimsa sings the chorus of Leonard Cohen’s Anthem. Our neighbours have become deeply emotional about these rituals, and applaud them for several minutes. Last week on Easter Sunday our eighty-year-old neighbour lady brought flowers from her garden to wish us.
I am grateful to see my elderly neighbours alive and my husband asked them last week if he can do their shopping for them. They were touched, as we thought that they should not be exposing themselves to the virus.
In the Belgian social media, I see many groups of people stitching masks for donation. They donate them to the police, front line workers at hospitals, shops and other areas which require essential workers. There is a strong desire to help.
In the meanwhile, Sri Lanka has a population of 21 million inhabitants. Currently, Sri Lanka has 271 cases on 19 April. The number of deaths is at 7.
Sri Lanka too started this whole saga with a long weekend and a Covid 19 public holiday exactly one month ago. It is also one month since schools closed in Belgium and in Sri Lanka.
Many people in Sri Lanka abused the Covid 19 public holiday to go on excursions as many did, in the rest of the world. Due to several other factors including the abused social distancing rules, strict curfew (military lockdown) came in a week later in Sri Lanka. We have just passed 3 weeks of curfew in Sri Lanka, at the time of writing. Since mid-March I have been observing the Covid 19 cases in Sri Lanka: counting on a daily basis. Some days I forgot to count but caught up on the next day.
In Sri Lanka – 19 April 2020, there have been only 7 recorded deaths.
My point is, that after five weeks, my motherland of 22 million people has 271 tested positive cases and 7 deaths.
The actual number of infected people could be higher. However, unlike many other countries, Sri Lankan authorities have a hotline to call and a medical team that comes to your home when you suspect that you have Covid 19. You are isolated, tested, your contacts traced and quarantined. There are quarantine centres run by the armed forces in five-star resorts donated by the private sector. There are university students who are inventing ventilators. There are armed forces that are stitching masks, protective suits or other material. The public at large has taken the responsibility to give up individual freedom and sacrificed many rights out of public health concern. The authorities and the front line workers are taking amazing measures to deal with shortages and challenges. There are those who hid their symptoms and put front line workers at risk. There are those who cheated the system. There are those who broke social distancing rules. As in many parts of the world, there are ‘Patient 31’ stories.
While there are some who complain of logistical difficulties, what I note from my friends and family back home is a system far better than most countries. This is a system which puts the value of human life above all else. There exists in Sri Lanka an excellent public health system which is free for everyone including “foreigners”.
I am grateful that we do not look at deaths in numbers yet, in Sri Lanka. It is yet to be seen what Sri Lanka will achieve. Economic losses, yes. And years of debt, perhaps. But what will be remembered from this period is this amazing grit and the perseverance shown by the people and the authorities in dealing with this pandemic.
I have never been prouder of my Sri Lanka.
While I grieve for Belgium, Europe and the rest of the world, I find solace in the fact that perhaps Sri Lanka will reduce the number of deaths. For me, this desire to see every single life saved, is what makes me feel Sri Lankan. For me, it is not only a desire but a duty, and I am grateful to recognize these thoughts in my people. I realize that I cannot visit my mother in the near future and she may leave us one day because of her fragile health. However, I am glad that I advocated such early lockdown measures for Sri Lanka; and what happens now will define the future of Sri Lanka.
