Flying In The Time Of Corona
yesterday I took my much dreaded journey back to my parents’ house in Switzerland.
I’d previously donated most of my fresh food to a lady battling cancer in my street who could not go out, and told my flatmate he can have whatever is left in the fridge when I leave.
I got up at 5:15am, got ready, finished packing and everything, then called an Uber at 6:10am. I got to the airport at around 7:00am.
the general mood at the airport was bleak. it wasn’t super busy, but there was quite a few people. a lot of Japanese people, I noticed. most of them in full hazmat. and I mean full, gloves, masks, goggles and all.
I checked in my bag and made my way through security as always (they had to take off their hazmat suits for that lol) before continuing to the waiting areas for gates A. it was just around 7:30am and according to the departures table they wouldn’t announce the gate for my flight to Zurich until 8:05am.
I walked around aimlessly, taking in the scene. 99% of the stores were closed. no restaurants, most duty free stores shut. Boots had a queue in place and would only let a handful of people enter at any one time.
I waited at a random gate until they finally announced mine so I went up to A17 and waited some more. boarding started around 8:20.
walking through the plane to 28F, I noticed that, wherever possible, they’d spread the people apart, meaning the middle seat in the rows of 3 were empty. since my row wasn’t like this (I was sitting next to an elderly couple in literal gas masks), I’m not sure if maybe the middle people just hadn’t arrived by the time I got in. they did say the flight was fully booked, so not sure.
honestly though, walking through the aisle past row upon row of people in all sorts of masks or full hazmat, I felt like I was boarding a plane to Chernobyl.
anyway, we departed with a delay of about 15 minutes but the flight itself was very nice. I did not see a single cloud between England and Switzerland. the weather was a dream -- no doubt due to the fact that England and France are on lockdown so there is barely any pollution in the air at the moment. but it made me sad because the weather was so incredible and everyone was stuck inside.
I made it to Switzerland at 11:40am local time (10:4am in the UK). just before we started landing, they advised us that the Swiss Health Department and the police have instructed them to have us remain in our seats after docking into the gate and only leave passengers out in small groups of up to 20 people to avoid large crowds and follow social distancing.
here is a video recording of the announcement.
about 10mins after landing, they asked those people with connecting flights to Stockholm and Tokyo to get off first to make sure they’ll make their connecting flights. I later learned from my dad that there won’t be any more fights to Tokyo after today which is why my flight was so full of Japanese people trying to get home asap.
after all transit people were off, they started letting us out group by group. first business class, then the first 4 rows of economy, the next 4, the next 4, etc. I was in group 2 in economy. upon leaving I told one of the flight attendants that I actually quite like this portioned leaving because it’s much less stressful, and she agreed.
also, the good thing was that the waiting gave them time to get our luggage to the baggage claim so I literally walked out the plane and instantly saw my suitcase. spent less than 2 minutes in the baggage claim area.
I met my dad in the arrival area (no hugs or anything obviously because he is 70 and god knows what I picked up in those airports), he drowned me in hand sanitiser and gave me a mask for the drive back home.
I got here around 1pm yesterday. it feels so weird to be back home, but good to be in my own bed again. I’m staying at least 6ft away from my dad at all times, and wear a mask whenever I’m not in my room, just to make sure. I will keep this up for about 5–7 days until I can be quite certain I didn’t pick it up on my way here.
I miss London already, I feel like I’ve abandoned my city in a way. I wanted to stay and be there for my neighbours and stuff. but the prospect of being trapped in that tiny room just fuelled my panic so bad. the space was the sole reason for me deciding to make that journey.
everyone I talked to about it said it was the right choice.
I wish I could believe this.
