Quarantine Diary: Day Two
Today is my third full day in London although it is officially Day Two. It is a quirk of British arithmetic that the first day counts as Day Zero and I don't understand how a whole day can count as zero, but then, many things in Britain are beyond my understanding.
As I said yesterday you underestimate the Brits at your peril; they mean business, so when they say quarantine they mean every letter of the word. I got my second telephone call from the Test and Trace team today – the second in two days. They asked a lot of questions to check my identity and location in line with the Passenger Locator form filled before departure. So far, the police have not knocked on the door but it is only the second day; more days ahead.
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I also had my first two home tests today using the home testing kit which I paid for before departure. The package contains two test kits and everything that is needed for home testing. I am lucky that my sister-in-law is a health professional and so I had no sweat in carrying out the test which we sent off in a prepaid return postage packet. So everything is planned and you have no excuse to slip up. By the way, failure to do any of the requirements leads to a huge fine, so you better do as instructed. Anyway, the weather continues to be unattractive so one might as well stay indoors. The challenge will be when the weather outside becomes tempting.
Normally, I spend my first couple of days in London browsing books at big bookshops. This is something I miss in Ghana. We don’t have real bookshops carrying thousands of titles outside the formal education system; indeed, most universities don’t even have good libraries, let alone bookshops. So, this forced home stay has deprived me of one activity I would do even in foul weather.
However, I am having a whale of a time with my brother and his family and continue to watch a lot of Ghana TV, especially channels I did not even know existed. Most of the stations I am watching are Akan language ones whose content is generated by people who take their personal issues to well-known presenters. Today, I watched a case on a Kumasi programme in which a young lady who feels cheated by her “baby father” is looking for him and has brought her case to the station for help. Her story is pathetic and deserves sympathy but the host appears to be more interested in the prurient details of the young woman’s sex life than the justice she is seeking.
A couple of things I am taking away from watching these episodes: one is the woeful absence of any observation of NMC codes by these media houses, and two, the need for the government to step into the miserable social lives of poor people in our country. Taking the first one first, although the programmes do not show any pornographic material, the language is too explicit, especially for daytime airing, and must carry some kind of warning.
On the second point, most of the victims who take their cases to the media are young women who have been deceived by men and have to bear the consequences of unprotected sex by themselves. At a minimum, the state has a responsibility to provide sex education in a manner that will protect poor young women from carrying the burdens of unwanted pregnancies. I hope the coming census can capture the number of single women on almost no income struggling to raise children on their own. It is a scandal and a national disgrace.
What is happening is that a huge number of young women are drifting into urban and peri-urban areas without any safety net in terms of accommodation or reliable family connections, so they are happy to accept the hospitality of any young man who speaks their language and has a place for them to lay their heads. Inevitably sexual intimacy ensues followed by an unplanned baby. At this point the man moves on leaving mother and baby to their fate. I am surprised that women’s rights groups and advocates have not given a bigger focus, if any, to this problem. So, all in all, these Kumasi stations are trying to fill a gap in society’s activities, but they are doing it in their own way and motives. Instead of pointing these people to the appropriate agencies for help, these presenters play prosecutor and judge on these cases, questioning the people about their intimate details, thus stripping them of what is left of their dignity. Maybe with some support and training, they would do it better and serve society more effectively.
Quarantine may not be all that bad seeing how it is making time for some reflections; but it is early days yet. Still counting minutes and days.
We shall overcome.
