Why is it 10 o'clock?
That is the question I often ask myself when I start writing at night. It is actually past midnight now, but I often don't get to write before 10 PM ever. Yes, I've tried making writing more of a priority, but in reality, it is something I only get to do when the kids are sound asleep and my wife and I don't have anything planned for the night.
During the day, it's chaos. Suriname moved into total lockdown because of 50+ cases in the past 5 days. Which might not sound like a lot for a whole country, but is a lot considering we were COVID free with just 11 cases for over a month. But something happened. Whether it was because of the elections, because of citizens from neighboring countries fleeing to Suriname or other reasons, the virus has jumped the border and could wreak havoc in a country where sticking to the rules can be particular hard because we don't have a culture and a structure that supports in times of a pandemic.
For starters, we don't have the actual funds to support business (or individuals in that matter) that are being hit by the coronavirus. But more over, the full panic mode that hits our population is insane. Where other countries stock toilet paper, in Suriname, we fill up our tank. Like we are all going on 200 mile roadtrip during total lockdown. The panic also creates other issues. Take it from someone who had to search for a gas cylinder for a week and ended up waiting in a line that broke several COVID guidelines.
[Yes. It happened. I waited in line for gas.]
There are a lot of things that scare me about our current situation. And then there is Facebook. In a whole league of its own.
First, there is the fun, the memes, our Director of National Safety responding to wether or not Adult Shops are essential businesses during lockdown by responding 'you need help'. But there is also the bad. The constant fighting. While the death of George Floydd and the Back Lives Matter protest do get attention, but it seems the conspiracy theories surrounding his death and the connection to the COVID pandemic are getting similar traction.
Yes, I'm all for decentralization of news and information (hence me posting on this platform), but there is a fine line between logical assumptions and actual investigative journalism. But hey, sometimes you just have to let it slide. Sometimes it are people that think that OneCoin is the future of crypto, sometimes it is a conspiracy which reveals the shocking truth which has been kept secret for decades. In the end, does it matter? Why spend time in jail for fighting someone that beliefs the Earth is flat? At least in that case we could just wipe COVID of the edge of the Earth and be done with it.
This post is inspired by @mariannewest's daily freewrite.
Read more about it here.
That is a lot of cases, considering you only had a few before. The story about the adult shop is funny. How can it be essential business. Keep safe @jeanlucsr. :)
It is actually even funnier, she actually said 'help yourself' 😂
Her reaction to the question
I'm not sure if journalists were trolling at that point and how the question got through the filter, but it happened.
Thanks and keep safe as well @juanvegetarian 🙏
That was trolling at its finest. Lol