Back in January, I passed through Customs Street in Auckland, my head down and my headphones firmly lodged in my ears. I was listening to the RTE Playback podcast. The street bustled with commuters hurrying to trains and ferries, in an urgent rush to get home or to the beach for a swim. The crowds around me in shorts and t-shirts offered a contrast to the stories of Mother and Baby homes, winter snow and Covid restrictions that were filtering through my headphones.
My path was blocked by a middle-aged woman, with one hand clasping a
phone to her ear while her other hand pressed against the glass door of the
Grand Mercure Hotel. As I got closer, I noticed a younger woman on the other
side of the glass. Her hands also cradled a phone while her palm was squeezed
against the door. They laughed and cried in equal measure. Mother and daughter
separated for years and now almost within touching distance.
New Zealand’s approach to Covid was summed up in their emotional
exchange. With a few exceptions, only Kiwis are allowed to fly back to their
home country. When they do, they are bussed straight to Hotels that are fenced
off and guarded by the NZ Defence Force. They spend two weeks there, getting
tested regularly and after 14 days, they can step through that glass door and
enter into the free world beyond. It can’t be easy being so close to your
family but not able to touch them, but 14 days in a nice hotel is a small price
to pay for the benefits that lie ahead.
Being Irish in New Zealand is an odd experience at the moment. Most of
us chose to live here because it is a beautiful country with easy-going people
and an outdoor healthy culture. Last March, we were handed an additional gift.
We found ourselves living in the country with the best approach to the virus in
the world. We have a government that listens to its scientific advisors and a
public that complies with the restrictions.
As a result, we have spent most of the last year living normally. Going
to concerts and football matches. And more importantly, being able to drink
white wine in the sun in a busy beer garden.
This elicits a little guilt. We have Zoom and Facetime and can see how
tough our relatives and friends are doing it back home. But I think what upsets
us most, is that we know that what worked here could also work in Ireland. We
live on Islands, we have similar populations, we have a large number of hotels
that will be empty if foreign tourists are kept out.
When New Zealand’s success in battling Covid is mentioned online, an
army of people who have never been here will reply with explanations ranging
from the remoteness of the place, the low density of the population and the
fact that hobbits are immune to the virus. New Zealand might be thousands of
kilometers away from anywhere else, but international air travel means that
nowhere is remote. Pre-Covid, thousands of tourists arrived here each day.
Auckland has a higher population density than Dublin. And as for the hobbits,
they packed up and left when the tourist buses stopped coming round.
The real reason for New Zealand’s success is that it threw a quarantine
blanket around its borders and told its citizens they could no longer go to Fiji
or Queensland on their holidays and that trips to support the All Blacks
overseas was off the cards.
Some right-wing commentators overseas see this as an open prison. That
we are trapped on an island surrounded by barbed wire. In fact, anyone that can
afford an airfare is free to leave any time you want. It’s only awkward when
you want to come back. And if you are willing to spend a couple of weeks in a
nice hotel, then coming back is manageable too.
In return, we were offered a ‘normal’ life. The only real change is that
Kiwis had to holiday in their own country this year. We saw parts of NZ we had
never been to before and in doing so, helped the tourist industry, which has
taken the brunt of the Government's border decisions. Statistics so far show
that the tourist industry is holding up. Kiwis are getting to do things they
always wanted to do, such as walk one of the countries famous national trails,
which were previously booked out by overseas tourists. We noticed this
ourselves in January when we holidayed in the South Island and most places
were busy.
Recently, New Zealand opened up a bubble with Australia and will soon do
the same with the Cook Islands. This means that quarantine is not required for
travel between these places and indicates that life is slowly getting back to
normal. As vaccines roll out across the world, this will also help to bring us
back to the days before that bat bit somebody in Wuhan.
I see that Ireland has introduced the Hotel quarantine model in a limited
form. I think it’s a no-brainer. The alternative is the constant drip-feed of
lockdowns, the tragic daily death toll and crippling pressure on the health
service. Throw a blanket across the borders, quarantine new arrivals and sit
back and enjoy the normality. If the biggest price to pay is that you have to
spend your holidays in Cliften this year, listening to a trad session while drinking
a creamy pint of Guinness, then take it.
It also means that I’ll be able to get back to Ireland sooner than I had
dreaded. If I don’t get to return until July 2022, it will be the longest time I’ve
ever been away from my homeland.
Nothing would make us Irish Kiwis prouder than seeing our home country
emulate New Zealand’s actions. And it might even ease the guilt of spending
another warm evening at the pub.
