Personal experience: due to the coronavirus pandemic, my vacation ended at the hospital

2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44

A tourist, vacationing in Sri Lanka, spoke about the difficulties with returning home and hospital confinement after arrival.

We, engineer Kostya and journalist Katya from St. Petersburg, were going on vacation in March, so in mid-February we bought tickets to Sri Lanka. In total, 56 thousand rubles were spent on round-trip tickets, and they planned to have a rest from 8 to 23 March.

The way to the destination was as follows: St. Petersburg - Moscow - Bahrain - Male - Colombo. The return trip should have been the same. Our flights to and from Sri Lanka were operated by Gulf Air, the flagship airline of the Kingdom of Bahrain.

They were just beginning to talk about the virus, there was no panic in Russia. In general, the situation was not taken seriously, because only China and the surrounding area were mentioned in the news. We did not have any concerns, despite the emerging alarming agenda. We assumed that the virus would reach the Russian Federation, but we did not think that so quickly.

How we learned about the coronavirus in Sri Lanka

We arrived on March 10 and stayed in the small town of Mirissa on the southern coast of Sri Lanka. We settled in a common cottage with five neighbors. In the first week, nothing boded bad news, we rested, sunbathed, surfed and ate fruit. Almost every day we saw turtles, monitor lizards and chipmunks while walking to the beach. We sat in a cafe on the coast. There were buses and tuk-tuk, a supermarket was opened.

On the sixth day of the vacation, we learned that three cases of coronavirus infection were found in Mirissa. Also, our neighbors transmitted rumors that the borders of the country would be closed and we would not be released. It was a little scary at first, but we tried not to panic. Our reaction is not to believe speculation and to check everything. We didn’t know if someone was really infected - we didn’t find any official information.

The next day, they stopped issuing visas upon arrival in the country, and online visas for many hung on confirmation. After that, the Sri Lanka border was indeed closed, but only for entry: foreign tourists were no longer allowed into the country. Some cafes began to close from March 14-15, but this did not particularly affect our vacation. We had a favorite place that continued to work, and we went there. There was no fear, just fewer locals on the streets.

How our flight was canceled

The situation in the world was heating up, rumors became more and more. At that moment, many companies began to cancel international flights, our friends switched to remote work, and in many countries they introduced a self-isolation regime.

First, we wrote to City. Travel, because we bought return tickets for March 23 on their aggregator site. We made a request to find out about a possible cancellation of the flight, but they did not find out anything specific from the answer. Then we called, but we were nineteenth on the line, and could not wait for several hours: the call cost 275 rubles per minute.

Next, we turned to the Gulf Air carrier. The company's website indicated that passengers need to follow the schedule, and we will be notified of any changes.

For example: 7:00 - get up, 7:15 - shower, 7:30 - tests, 8:00 - breakfast, 8:30 - work, 10:30 - call a friend, and so on. She also kept a diary, where she wrote down my thoughts and experiences, which also helped not to get discouraged.

By March 29, the discharge regime had changed: they were released from the hospital after one negative test for coronavirus. My result was negative, only a runny nose remained of the symptoms, and I went home.

In general, I am even grateful for the fact that this test fell on me.

I spent five days in the hospital and during this time I began to look at the usual things in a different way: access to fresh air, the opportunity to eat deliciously, to feel the touch of loved ones.

It sounds corny, but in everyday life, being in comfort, we cease to notice the value of all this. And only in times of hardship do we understand how important this is.

Kostya was not taken to the hospital because he had no symptoms. On the second day after the beginning of my imprisonment, the district doctor contacted him, inquired about his health, asked to monitor the temperature and send a report on a regular basis. A day later, a health worker came to the house to take biomaterial for an initial analysis for coronavirus (it turned out to be negative).

Now we, like most people, continue to live in self-isolation. We order groceries at home, we don’t buy anything in tons. If there is something missing, we go to the nearest store, wearing a mask.

Overall, the vacation went well. Unless we were able to go on excursions, did not ride on the Sri Lankan train and did not count the arches of the famous nine-arch bridge. I hope it will work out some other time.

Coronavirus. Number of infected:

243 068 419

in the world

8 131 164

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