Jon Snow: How I'm spending my 14 days in coronavirus self-quarantine
As a journalist you expect to be spat at, shot at, even kidnapped, but the unexpected wholesale removal of 14 days of your normal life – that never appeared on the job spec.
It all started with a life-long obsession with Iran, beginning with a cultural exchange in 1969, in which UK students traded places with equivalent Indian peers. The route of the drive to India took us through the vast entity that is Iran, where my love affair flourished.
Getting a visa for Iran as a journalist is not that easy. The decision is made in Tehran. Sometimes you get one, more times you don’t. This was one of those “got one” moments and so with a happy heart, I set off with my cameraman and producer, 10 days ago, to report on the country’s parliamentary elections.
But in the five days we were there the elections became hopelessly overshadowed by the outbreak of the coronavirus. Masks were breaking out everywhere. Our previous obsession with Iranian democracy began to sink, to be swamped by the outbreak of virus fear. With 13 million souls in Tehran ripe for infection, we decided to head out of town. It proved a brilliant excuse to make for Isfahan, nearly six hours away. On the way we passed the turnoff to the very centre of Shia Islamic pilgrimage – the holy city of Qom – and tragically the very centre of Iran’s struggle with the outbreak. What worse point of departure for any virus than mass prayerful kneeling, by many tens of thousands of pilgrims.
By the time we reached Isfahan, the masks were breaking out there too. Crossing the gorgeous 33 arches of the city’s five-century-old bridge, people talked to us candidly about their fears.
It was soon after our arrival there that we were told our flight home on Turkish Airlines had been cancelled because of the virus outbreak. Turkey, in common with other surrounding states, had closed her borders. Suddenly I began to fear the worst; that we would be trapped, perhaps for months. But my fears never extended to the possibility of catching the disease itself. Heaven knows why not! My colleagues dialled the travel agents in London and we got the last three seats to Qatar.
Seventeen hours on from leaving Isfahan, we landed at Heathrow. I had expected to be frog-marched to ambulances parked on the tarmac. In that moment Iran was not even on the list. We each went home and plugged into normality. Last Tuesday morning, just 12 hours later, it all changed. Amid instructional chaos, NHS England decided that countries beginning with “I” had had it; to be precise, Italy and Iran. No, we didn’t need to be tested for the virus – undetected now, it might be preparing to burst forth at some future moment. Yes, we would have to be at home and submit to “self-isolation”, whatever that was when it was at home. At home it was, alone. The endurance was to last for a fortnight. I wondered if that sounded less than 14 days.
I was to be allowed family visits as long as they were in other rooms, and if we met it would have to be at two metres apart. Alas my wife was on a business trip to Uganda and away for another six days. Her nephew lives with us; would he stay or would he go? He wanted to stay to be the go-between with the outside world. The NHS rules allowed it.
Most of the time I am alone. In the first day or two I went mad around the house – cleaning out drawers, hoovering carpets, tidying long untidied cupboards. Making cups of coffee. Turning the radio on – turning it off – and finally settling down to Channel 4 News. Paranoid, I thought, much too good without me.
I find myself thinking about the first thing I was going to do when I got back from Iran: visit my first grandson, Marley, who is 14 precious weeks old. Damn it – another two weeks without seeing him.
Three days in, and I’m driven to think about necessities; the loo rolls have run out. It is only now that for the first time in my life I think about home deliveries.
I wake up to Ocado. I scour the web, sign up and place an order. Of course I’m under the illusion that it comes within an hour or two, in time for that night’s supper. No, Jon, it will be between 9 and 10am tomorrow.
Many have called, texted and emailed – this is when you find out who your friends really are.
I intend to go back to that book I abandoned writing a year ago. I haven’t yet touched it. I enjoy water colours – I might paint, but haven’t yet. As I write, I have only been in such confinement for four days; what on earth sort of shape shall I be in come 10 days’ time? Will I still have a job? Will she still love me?
