Between Bread And Liberties; Hunger Wins

The human mind survives, even thrives, on an age-old but simple mechanism called complacency. Even when things look pretty bad, it keeps saying, no, it can’t happen to you.

- Gamini Akmeemana

Even as sectors of Colombo barely two kilometers away from my home came under lockdown, my mind wasn’t fully prepared for that eventuality – that where I live will come under lockdown. We will be bypassed by Covid-19, we will somehow be spared. But lockdown came suddenly, as swiftly as dusk falls these days, on the afternoon of Sunday October 25. The radio announced that curfew will be imposed in Colombo 8 at 6.00 pm.

To avoid confusion, what we have here is legally and technically a curfew, not lockdown. But the latter word is current all over the world where Covid-19 is spreading, and the differences between curfew and lockdown can blur. For example, during lockdown people are expected not to exit a specific area, but essential services such as groceries and pharmacies remain open. Residents can exit their homes and localities with a special permit. This is similar to our curfew, because some essential services operate within that and people can obtain curfew passes in some cases.

Waking up to reality can be painful. It’s also time-consuming. You want to buy extra quantities of essentials before the crisis becomes full-blown. But your capacity to do this has been bludgeoned by the post-Covid-19 economy. When you realize that all supermarkets and groceries in the area will close at six, and you don’t know when they will re-open, you know that you can’t survive for long with what you have.