As
of 6pm, local time, Athens:
#
of confirmed cases: 743 (48 new cases since yesterday)
#
of deaths: 20
#
of people in hospital: 134
Day
16 of staying home
In
today’s 6pm live press briefing Health Ministry spokesman Sotiris Tsiodras and
Deputy Civil Protection Minister Nikos Hardalias made more announcements. Some
are summarized below.
Tsiodras
again stressed that the aim is to protect the population, which requires a
national effort.
He
also reminded that people who are not in the high-risk categories, should remain at
home if they start to show symptoms, and contact their doctor on a daily basis
to check in on their progress.
Hardalias
began by reporting that the majority of the public is adhering to the ban on
movement and all the measures. He thanked the public for their cooperation and
urged everyone to continue to follow any and all new rules.
From
March 26 – April 25, supermarkets will be open according to this schedule:
Monday thru Friday, 7am to 9pm. Saturday 7am to 8pm. Sundays closed.
A
total of 263 Greeks returning from Spain, including many students, have been
put under quarantine at an Athens hotel. All 263 were tested and 21 were found
positive.
Hardalias
reminded everyone that there are no exemptions to the measures, and no one is
above the rules.
***
That
moment in the morning when I wake up, rubbing my bleary eyes, bits of dream
still replaying in my head. Stretch. It’s another day… Is it Tuesday,
Wednesday? My eyes look towards the balcony door… Is it a sunny day?
Those first moments when my fuzzy mind has not yet recalled anything, is still
in start-up mode, it still thinks it’s just another normal day. And then, click
– a switch is flipped, and I remember. Something in me freezes for a second. This
is really happening. And this new reality comes flooding in, along with the
sun’s early rays, as I pull the wooden shutters open. The hazy images of my
dreams are replaced by words flashing across a screen.
Contagion, epidemic, crisis.
My
morning coffee is again accompanied by the low whirring sound of helicopters
flying by. All day, now and then, I can hear it. I watched three helicopters
flying together, heading towards downtown Athens. They reached a certain point
and each branched off in a different direction.
I
need to go in a different direction too, I thought. And so today, I, too, went
up. Perspective. It really does change everything.
Today,
I did something that I’ve never done before. I took my favorite old chair, and
lugged it up to the taratsa, the roof. I’ve been living in this building
for 20 years and I guess it had to take a pandemic and an order not to leave
the apartment for me to figure out that the taratsa is really the best seat in
the house.
It
was like another universe up there. The sky! I could see the vastness of the
sky, the blueness, the various shades of grey, dark and light of the clouds.
The mountains… purple-hued and clear. I sat. I did nothing. I looked. A
butterfly (a butterfly!) flew inches above my head. I closed my eyes. I
listened. The birds chirped; the bus rolled by on the streets below. The city
still hummed, even now. The slow woosh of traffic. A purring helicopter. The sun’s
warmth on my face, a light breeze on my skin. The waft of something delicious coming
from the air shaft which connects all of the kitchens below.
In
the distance, Mt Lykavittos. The Acropolis. For now, I can’t go for my usual
walk to Pnyx Hill, opposite the Acropolis. But here I
am, and there’s the
Acropolis, I can see it, just over the rooftops. For over 2,000 years it has
reigned over this ever-changing landscape. It has seen
wars, bombings, famine, occupation,
crises, plagues. And it’s still here.
Looking
up into the sky, I saw two birds. One big, one smaller. They circled one
another, flew close, flew apart, came together, swooped and glided.
I closed my
eyes. Everything seemed to fall away. I
listened. And I heard what Athens was telling me.
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