My Dream Year by Ruth Bonita

Ruth Bonita, a public health academic, is currently working on a journal-memoir, ‘My Dream Year.’  Her initial intention was to capture her joy of having the whole family in New Zealand for a year with the arrival from Scotland of her daughter, son-in-law and their two young boys to live just down the road. She had no intimation of what was to come, that the journal would soon become, as well, a chronicle of the impact of coronavirus on the world.
 
Thursday, 23rd April 2020
 
Only 2 new cases (but 2 dead – both from the same rest home)
Total cases in New Zealand: 1,454; 12 deaths
Total cases worldwide: 2.75 million; 87,000 deaths
 
As the news items roll off the screen, I can barely contain my disgust at the litany of lies and the ensuing damage caused by Trump. It’s endless.  A constant barrage.   It’s said that he tweets, on average, every 7.5 minutes to millions - up to 80 million - of his followers although undoubtedly this is a talk up to a large extent; more than half, it has been estimated, are fake.   Each tweet is worse than the previous. In a recent interview he muses about injecting disinfectant – or “somehow” getting light into the body as a deterrent to the virus.  Meanwhile, the Justice Department sides with plaintiffs against different states’ stay-at–home orders; Trump places a For Profit Insurer in charge of hospital Covid-19 funds; $300 million of the funds allocated to small businesses are eaten up by corporations; the public social safety net is not working and millions of American citizens are denied access to stimulus packages because they are married to immigrants. And Trump continues to plunder for his own benefit: a Trump hotel in Manhattan seeks rent relief from the Trump administration. A new US Relief Bill of $500 billion lacks funds for food aid, rent relief, postal service, or election protection. 26 million have lost their jobs in the last 5 weeks.
 
There are rapid increases in cases, 835,000, and deaths, 43,000 in the USA.  A few key papers explain how these figures are likely to under represent the true picture. I stand by and watch in disbelief. Trump blames it on the Chinese, saying “no one was warned”. I could go on, but I must stop obsessing about Trump and the train wreck that the USA is about to become. 
 
Much as I revile Trump, I was reminded tonight, as we watched the Netflix film Sergio, just how awful GW Bush was as well, unbearably so.  And how Paul Bremner, the face of the US presence in Iraq after the overthrow of Saddam Hussain, set in motion an illegal occupation of the country by American troops, refusing to allow the UN to broker arrangements for fresh elections.  I remember, in 2003, when I was working at the World Health Organisation in Geneva, the shock and horror that rippled through United Nations offices around the world, when Sergio De Mello, head of the UN office in Iraq, was killed in the bomb attack on the United Nations building in Baghdad.
 
Sergio was meant to be a tribute to a remarkable man, but it was just too syrupy and too long with far too much focus on his fling with a breathless young woman in the international NGO sector: steamy scenes in hot tropical places. She was inappropriately clad as a foreigner, thin backless dresses, the plunge line dropping so far as to barely cover her nipples. It was embarrassing to watch her walk arrogantly through street markets in East Timor, the locals turning away from such a sight; she was oblivious of her impact on anyone except her prey, Sergio, married father of two boys.  
 
Putting the doom and gloom of the global picture aside, all seems good in New Zealand. Simon Bridges has been firmly put in his place after an appalling Facebook entry attacking the government’s decision to delay re-entry to level 3 by five days. As it is kindly put, he “misread the room,  made a poor judgment of the mood of the country …” clearly oblivious to the huge support for Jacinda’s actions throughout this pandemic.
 
And it was a lovely day, if windy. Robert, on his usual long low tide walk to Takapuna and back, came across a fisherman who was being questioned by an official.  Not because he had broken lockdown rules by going out with his kayak to lay the net, but because he was over his limit: he had netted 35 fish.  He gave Robert two large Kahawhai fillets, which, later, pan fried, were fresh and strong in taste.  They filled our plates.  Fresh lemon added the perfect touch. What an unusual lockdown treat!