Tag: Isolation

Friday 13 August 2021 – Auckland.

Quarantine, Day 11, Wednesday.

The room here in Rydges (eighth floor, northwest corner) is pretty quiet, most of the time it sounds and feels like we are the hotel’s only residents. We know there are neighbours and people on the opposite side of the corridor, we have seen them, though we never hear them. I am assuming they do not hear us either.

As our days are not exactly filled with activity we have become excited by the routine of room-service delivered meals and my (our?) ears are tuned to the sound of room service working their way up the corridor to our room, the furthest from the lift. I can hear the gentle knock and the accompanying call of ‘room service’ mixed with the rustle of the paper bags the food is delivered in from quite a few rooms away. The Pavlovian response is to start to move towards the door, unhook and fit the mask and wait to call ‘Thanks’ when our door is knocked. I am waiting for this as I type, it is approaching lunch time.

I am not sure what I would do if we heard the knock coming and it didn’t arrive on our door.

After saying our room is quiet, I found the street noise really loud last night and had trouble getting to sleep, this is the first time it has bothered me and I hope it will be the last.

I had a solo walk this morning, Eleanor wasn’t feeling it, so I went down to the forecourt on my own. I was on my own for the first 15 minutes. It was great, I walked in a figure of 8 rather than round and round. One takes excitement where one can.

The rest of the day was the same as every other day though with added bad day-time telly; reading, music, writing and eating.

Quarantine, Day 12, Thursday.

When I woke this morning and was still in that mild brain-fog stage before full consciousness (pre-coffee) I was unclear if it was Thursday or Friday and whether we had one or two more days to go. This confusion was only cleared when I checked the day on my phone. Time is starting blur, though I am surprised it took so long for that to happen.

Today is day 12 testing and there are some hotel departures this morning, a schedule was left by the lift doors. This means that the forecourt and ramp are closed to exercise for quite some time. I didn’t get to repeat my solo walk on the forecourt this morning which was a shame.

We got called for our final Covid test, the much anticipated day 12 test mid-morning. It was good to get it out of the way. The result from this test will determine whether we get to leave on Saturday or not and I am assuming it will be negative and we’ll be good to go. The test isn’t too painful, a swab up the nose and a good wriggle around for a few seconds, it is irritating more than painful and I always need to sneeze after. The results will be with us before we are let out.

We had our final roof walk at 1:30 which I much appreciated, the roof is the best place to walk and we are only allowed a walk there every second day. We took some selfies, hopefully the last ever masked-up selfie we will take. Sadly I suspect this will not be the case, there feels like an inevitability that the Delta Variant will make it’s way into New Zealand somehow. I just hope we get some ‘freedom’ time beforehand.

I found a photo of us that I (shakily) took just before we left my flat before the move to London. I miss my flat. We were a lot thinner then, and it was only June!

I finished reading another book today, the third I have read in isolation. A novella by J.G. Ballard that is providing some ‘inspiration’ for the short story I have started working on. We have also started watching the first series of ‘My life is Murder’, a light touch detective series set in Melbourne and starring NZer Lucy Lawless (Xena the Warrior Princess), the second series is set in Auckland and has just started on  ‘normal’ TV. It is enjoyable and light and perfect isolation watching.

I have been annoying Eleanor by asking to take photos of her as I am bored, eventually eliciting this response. Oh, well it kept us (me) entertained for a while.

I was experimenting with some movement shots and I think she got a bit sick of shaking her head rapidly.  I fully understand, I would be the same!

I went back to taking photos out of the window as the sun went down, it seemed less likely to respond with two fingers.

Quarantine, Day 13, Friday.

Yay, the penultimate day. One more sleep and we are out of here!

Its mid-evening and I really cannot recall much about the day, it has all been a bit of a blur. There was no outside walking today as there are lots of people departing the hotel, apparently there has been a Covid positive guest who was moved out today as well.

This was not good timing for us as I received my negative test result about 10:30 and Eleanor didn’t get hers until after 4, and that was after ringing three times. It was a very stressful wait, though I was certain it would be negative, which is was. Though having to wait so long was quite unfair.

I finished the Hawkwind book this morning, isolation read number four. It is safe to say I am happy that I managed to get through quite a bit of reading in this very dead 14 days.

We watched TV, ate the required amount of way too much and shared a bottle of pinot gris. I took one final photo out the big window. We had some interesting sunsets, but nothing truly spectacular. Those will come tomorrow when we are gone.

Tomorrow we leave and I might write up my thoughts on the two weeks. I will see how busy things get. I am not going to miss the room (obviously), but it has been OK and we have survived the two weeks in isolation relationship intact. There is no-one else I would want to be stuck in a hotel room, or anywhere else with.

Roll on seeing family, (awkward) hugs and a big walk outside tomorrow.

Quarantine, Day 8, Sunday.

Phew, made it over the hump of half way, sanity intact. I think. Eleanor may have a different view.

We managed to get out for a 30 minute walk first thing(ish), before breakfast or coffee at least. The only reason we made it out before coffee was because we didn’t have any left, and we had misread the opening time on the hotel coffee shop info sheet and thought it closed. As we walked we observed the barista through the café window busily making coffee so I double-checked once we were back in the room and ordered an immediate flat white fix. This was the first coffee we have ordered and it was very enjoyable too, as was breakfast. 

Our supermarket order arrived not long after breakfast so life will return to normal tomorrow as we now have more ground coffee for the pot. Coffee is an important part of the day. I know I should give it up as caffeine is really bad, one day…

The afternoon walk on the roof was cancelled due to the terrible weather.

I am actually enjoying the rain and the relative coolness that comes with it. The room gets quite warm and stuffy when the sun is on the big window. To replace the walk exercise we ordered new bedding and spent 10 minutes changing the bed, trying to give it a hotel quality finish. This is more difficult than it sounds, so my respect for hotel staff has gone up another notch.

On the subject of hotel staff… The staff here at Rydges; hotel, defence force, aviation security and others, have been magnificent, always cheerful, helpful and friendly. We have hada lot more interaction with the various teams than you do in a normal hotel, it is very well organised and I absolutely appreciate the work they do and the cheery way they go about it. Other than each other they are the only people we have had actual contact with so far.

We started watching Starsky and Hutch, from the first series made in 1974. It is surprisingly not terrible and I imagine we will watch more episodes.

Quarantine, Day 9, Monday.

Not a lot of sleep was had last night. A pre-season friendly football match between my team, Arsenal and Eleanor’s, Tottenham Hotspur was on at 1:00am and we ‘got up’ to watch it. We have been together for eight years, and the North London Derby, as this game is known as, happens at least twice a year, sometimes more if we meet in cup competitions. This is only the second time we have watched it together. Our clubs have a bitter rivalry going back to 1913, when Arsenal moved from their original base in Woolwich, south London to Islington in the north. The rivalry does sometimes come across in our supporting and it has been agreed that it is best to not watch this game together; in normal circumstances. Anyway it was a stupid game and not worth waking up for, Arsenal lost.

I didn’t really sleep properly after the game and was tired all day, fortunately other than a 9:15 roof walk we had nothing else planned…

We managed to stick to that plan and did nothing else all day, though I did start to scratch out some idea for the short story I wanted to start in MIQ and have failed to do so. It was a fairly listless day.

Quarantine, Day 10, Tuesday.

Four more sleeps.

I spent the first waking hours of this morning, that horrible time when I wake between 2 and 3am and don’t drift back to sleep until after 5, thinking about what things will be like when we get out into the real world.

I am a little apprehensive of this, particularly what (if anything) people expect of me/us. I am of the impression that a lot of people in New Zealand don’t get what it has been like living in a Covid world for the past 15 months. For instance, apart from the occasional elbow bump, the individuals who delivered my two vaccinations and the occasional brush of fingers as I passed a glass or a plate to a friend on those rare occasions we socialised (within the rules of course), I have not touched anyone other than Eleanor since March 2020. There has been no shaking of hands, nor mwah mwah kiss on the cheek or hug goodbye. I am socially awkward at the best of times, and I am not sure how to respond once we can see friends and family in an environment with no restrictions, or any need to have restrictions. It is going to be uncomfortable and I am hoping that people will accept that I/we need time to adjust. An for God’s sake please don’t stand too close to me in a queue.

This world is very different to the one we have just left and I might have to take public transport just to be in the same space as other people wearing masks.

Over the weekend we chose our menu for this week and have drastically reduced the amount of food we are given each day. There is still too much given the low number of calories we are burning, but the volume is less than last week. Today was the only day this week I asked for a cooked breakfast; it was poached egg on corn fritter day and that was my most enjoyed breakfast from last week.

After breakfast we secured a walk in the forecourt. I was surprised by this as it was 9:30 and I thought our chance of getting an un-booked and immediate walk would be low. There was  another couple out and we talked to them for most of the walk and it was very enjoyable, the first time we have properly conversed with people since we arrived. It helped that it is a nice, though cool day.

It was interesting to see how many uncollected breakfasts were outside other doors on our floor as we walked back to the room. I think that now we are three days into week two some people are just spending more time in bed; for most there is no real need to get up, it’s not as if you can do anything. This may explain why we managed to get a walk in at the first call.

I am still tired, though a lot perkier today, I even spent some time writing as well as reading and perusing social media. Today did not feel like a total waste.

I have not been taking many photos, hence the lack of images in this post. I was hoping to take at least one photo each day, though have barely been able to achieve that. The view has gotten kind of boring and I am lacking in imagination. Maybe tomorrow I will try harder, one of my goals for this time in isolation was to come up with some photography ideas for our time in New Zealand. Writing and taking photos, maybe that was one creative goal too may for isolation. I had forgotten about how bad jet-lag impacts me.

Unless something unexpectedly exciting happens then this day is done. So it is time to click that publish button.

Saturday 7 August 2021 – Auckland.

Quarantine, Day 4, Wednesday.

The days seem to be moving fairly quickly. So far so good.

Last night I booked an 8:00am walk on the ‘ramp’, a short ramp down into the basement car park below the hotel. We can only walk on the ramp, no deviating into the car park, no walking too close to the street. An airforce person stands there, masked up, watching us. It is only us on the ramp, one bubble at a time. No running.

Most of the time I don’t feel like we are being detained, so get annoyed with people on the MIQ BookFace group we belong to who moan about being in prison. However, being watched by someone in a uniform and a mask does make the situation somewhat prison-like. The BookFace group has been useful and it was where I found out about bringing useful things like sticky hooks for the room, or getting someone to drop off crockery and cutlery. However, I will leave it once we leave isolation and I have it muted now. There is a lot of moaning and there are far too many stupid questions. My tolerance for stupid is notoriously low.

The walk was nice, no roof above us, and as Eleanor pointed out, it was the first time in a week we have walked somewhere that was not dead flat. We have a nice view of the back of Auckland District Court.

The rest of the day passed in a blur of typing, reading, eating, drinking and the Olympics. Pretty much the same as yesterday (though today we watched the movie Yesterday, which was something we didn’t do yesterday, nor will we do tomorrow). I am writing this tomorrow morning, and really cannot remember anything that stood out from yesterday, or today.

I drank a Fanta, a first in a long time, it was nice and I will have one next week too, but never again, it is too sweet. What happens in isolation stays in isolation.

Quarantine, Day 5, Thursday.

The day started with a second Russian Dolls watching session with our friends in London and Spain, we watched the last four episodes and agreed it was a very good series. We now need to choose the next series to watch, that one was fun. Truth be told, the day started with coffee and social media in bed, like every other day since lockdown started in March 2020.

I managed to grab an immediate outside walking slot outside when I rang reception, I did not think this was possible, and was very happy to get 30 minutes of walking outside while Eleanor did some exercise in the room. That is the longest we have been apart in the last week. I listened to an old Hawkwind album as I walked and enjoyed it immensely.

I needed to change the contact details on my bank account from my UK phone number to my new NZ number. This is a lot harder than it should be, mainly because all the banks send a text to your old number before you can change it to a new one. Before we left the UK I had (foolishly it now turns out) stopped calls and texts coming to my UK number. I wasn’t going to answer them so there seemed to be no point in receiving them.  Ah ha, I thought, I can log into my mobile account on the Vodafone website and change that feature so I can receive the texts, except the website sends a text to authorise the login… I got there eventually. I considered it a proactive use of otherwise dead time.

We got our day three Covid test result today, as expected they were negative, though there is always a small moment of nervousness before they come through.

The big news for the day was we booked our meals for next week. This was very exciting. We were provided lunch not long after we arrived way back on day zero. What we failed to notice at the time was the feed bag (neigh) had a note attached with a QR code. Hidden behind this QR code was the menu for the week and we could have chosen from an, albeit, limited range of options. Oh well, the food has generally been good. I take excitement where I can.

We managed to get one more walk on the ramp late in the afternoon, we are only allowed on the ramp every second day, sharing is caring and all that.

There was another nice sunset.

Quarantine, Day 6, Friday.

We both had the best sleep so far, I am so glad we are getting to process jetlag ourselves, normally I would be falling asleep on mum’s sofa in the early evening while she chats to me. It will be good to not do that when we get out. I am still tired, though this is a reasonably normal state.

We woke up to grey sky and rain, and it remained like that all day. This was a bit of a relief as I told Eleanor (and anyone else who asked) that Auckland is cold and wet in August. on Tuesday our room was 26.5 degrees with the sun beating in through that large window.  I was finally seeing some cold and wet and felt vindicated.

The big news for the day was fish and chips for lunch, and they were good, it is good to know that that English tradition of fish ‘n chip Friday exists in New Zealand. The only wrong thing with fish ‘n chips for lunch today was we had cancelled the hotel dinner as we were going to order a pizza for dinner. Two big meals in one day, oh well. Explains the waistline I guess. Obviously we went ahead with the pizza order, it was OK.

I had a solo walk in the covered roof space this afternoon, more Hawkwind on the headphones, LP 3 listened to now, still enjoying it and cannot believe I was so disdainful of the band for so long. For a brief moment I was alone in the space, other than the masked up airforce person making sure I behaved myself; no running, no touching the hand rails, mask on at all times. I haven’t been alone for quite some time and am absolutely looking forward to it.

We have been doing one of the jigsaw puzzles mum dropped off, there is limited space for them and the light is terrible in the evening, but it is almost done, tomorrow we will have the excitement of finishing the seemingly impossible to complete sky.

The rain stayed for the whole day. There is so little to take photos of in, or from the room, so here is some more rain from the room’s big window. I have not desaturated the image, it is just very grey out there.

Quarantine, Day 7, Saturday.

Half way through and just starting to get a bit bored, though I have yet to start doing anything I planned to do over these two weeks so that must be a good thing. I was planning on writing a short story, or at least starting one. I have a couple of ideas, but am lacking in enthusiasm at the moment. Too tired. There is plenty of time…

Awful sleep, misreading the watch I was up and making coffee at 5:05am, thinking it was after 6. This has left me feeling tired and disconnected all day, and we have run out of coffee with none due until tomorrow.

I had booked a ramp walk for 11 today and mum dropped by while we were out and  gifted us some more oat milk, pre-planned obviously. It was great to briefly see mum, though it is really windy and we were 4 metres apart so could be barely hear each other. A few muffled half-shouted words were all we managed. It was nice though!

We have given up on the puzzle it’s gotten too difficult, the sky is a nightmare, for every piece I put in I am taking another piece out as it is wrong. We don’t have a great workspace so time on the puzzle is spent bent over the low top and we are both feeling it in our lower backs. Time to pack this one away and start the next. 

We did our own thing this afternoon, happily. I am half way through reading Richard Osman’s ‘The Thursday Murder Club’ and am determined to finish it today, I only started it this morning. It is a lot of fun. Obviously I am not reading a book here.