Journal of a Pandemic Traveler
/“But I assured them, Lord, that this trip wasn’t a suicide mission. More than anything, it was a friendship trip, but that’s none of their business.”
Against friends’ and family’s pleas to not go at this time because it was peak season for Covid-19 and California took the crown for being the hotbed of the pandemic, I went.
“The alien has landed in San Francisco!” I posted on Facebook with a close-up picture of me in a mask and face shield. It yielded a tsunami of shocked reactions. “Take care!” “Ingat!” I couldn’t agree less. I needed to be very careful out there even if I felt bulletproof and that I would be able to fight the virus if I caught it. But I bought travel insurance for good measure. You never know.
"The alien has landed in san Francisco!" I posted on Facebook on December 23, 2020.
It was two days before Christmas. I had made up my mind that I would not leave the Bay Area on this trip and that I would only see three friends while there: Ana Alabado Segovia; Nina Quesada Resmini; and Cion Bote Salcedo.
Cion picked me up at the airport and dropped me off at my Airbnb apartment on 4th Avenue three blocks from Golden Gate Park. Nice! It had two queen beds, a kitchen, bath, laundry, and a backyard garden. Ana and Nina sent enough food and wine to get me through my voluntary ten-day quarantine.
My Airbnb apartment was on this empty 4th Avenue @ Anza on Christmas day 2020
The Bay Area was on lockdown again. Everyone was asked to stay home except for essential needs and maybe to exercise in the park. BART trains weren’t running and neither were street and cable cars. All restaurants were closed except for take outs. Gyms and most services were closed. But malls and retail stores were open. We needed some place to spend our $600 stimulus checks, right?
I stepped out of my apartment at 10:00 on Christmas morning and there was not a soul around. Cars parked along the streets weren’t moving. I breathed the perfect 50-degree temperature of the city and started walking in silence.
Golden Gate Park had a few runners and bikers, walkers and talkers. I said Merry Christmas to everyone I passed. It was my third Christmas since my husband Bert died, and I could now face loneliness with a straight face.
The next day I set out for Trader Joe’s for food cravings, then took a long turn to Haight Ashbury and the Golden Gate panhandle.
In Manila I read that folks in the USA were stubbornly huddled together and maskless and that’s why there was so much Covid getting people sick and dying. Now here, I found those statements to be untrue. Americans, like folks around the world, were just as afraid to catch the virus, but they had to go to work, school or wherever and well, s--t happens. The rule here was that you could go without a mask when outdoors but not when within six feet or so of another person. Still, I rarely saw anyone too brave or stubborn to defy Dr. Fauci.
Lord forgive me, I broke my quarantine on New Year’s Day. Cion and I drove 45 minutes to Santa Clara. I wanted desperately to see my best travel buddy, Ana, who this year suffered a horrible fight with breast cancer. Her six chemo sessions sucked the living daylight out of her body, poor, poor thing. I loved this woman so much and cried reading her stories of pain, anguish, and longing for relief. Five months from the start, her chemo was finally over and her doctors declared her cancer-free. I wanted to make sure Ana was busy building a new Ana.
New Years Day 2021 with Nina Resmini, Cion Salcedo and Ana Segovia.
What I saw was reassuring. Ana, her head still fashionably covered with a scarf, and husband, Tommy, had prepared a feast for a king or queen or a jack, for that matter. Huge steamed oysters! Oysters Rockefeller! Steamed lobsters! Paella! Gambas! Prime rib! What energy to cook and get all those in order. Nina arrived and brought more food. The new year couldn’t have had a better start.
Between New Year and the day I got back on the plane for home, Cion and I walked every square foot of San Francisco, up every cable car route and stairway that climbed to the sky, down the broad boulevard at Ocean Beach and around every tourist destination that was now devoid of people. We also checked out retail stores for my survival needs in Manila. To ensure customer distancing, most stores had an employee counting people going through their doors; thus, more popular stores had long lines and wait time to get in.
We went on day trips out of the city -- to Sonoma, Sacramento, and Monterey. The crowd was thickest in Monterey because it was a gorgeous Sunday and folks anxiously jumped out of hibernation.
It was a sad day the last time I walked with Cion to walk their dog Charlie. It was January 20 and I was leaving that evening. Cion and husband, Rudy, drove me to the airport and I again waited for a Philippine Airlines flight, this time for home.
Seeing a cablecar at Ghirardelli Square without people hanging off of it like Christmas ornaments was one of the saddest things I'd seen.
Going Home
I had originally scheduled my return for January 30, but with the once-again growing cases of Covid in the Philippines and the arrival of its meaner UK variant, I was afraid the country might again close its doors to travelers and I’d be locked out of my home. As I write this, doors are still open, but the rules on incoming and outgoing travelers change from day to day.
I was on my way home happy I did not catch the virus in California. I was certain because a swab test told me so. I had taken a test before I left Manila and then had a test done in San Francisco. Both negative. I had followed all the rules on how not to catch the virus – wore my mask, kept my distance, and washed my hands often. Was I merely lucky? Let’s see if I would be lucky all the way home.
My PAL flight was barely a tenth full. There were a number of OFWs heading home from I don’t know where. I was seated on an exit row and the nearest passenger was five rows back. From restroom to restroom, our section had at most six passengers including a mother with two babies and an older man who was shivering in the cold cabin.
I was impressed that PAL’s flight attendants seemed to check the restrooms for cleanliness after every use. They were just as paranoid as we all were about the damn virus.
The Manila airport was prepared for our arrival. Guys wearing masks and face shields, some in PPEs, were lined up to make sure we did not detour from our arrival route. Only Filipino passport holders were allowed into the country at this time. The strong and powerful UK variant of Covid-19 had reared its ugly head in the country and the powers weren’t taking chances of having more come through its doors.
Cion and I climbed every stairway, every uphill street of SF just because they're there.
The rule at the time of my return in Manila was that all passengers were to be swab tested upon arrival ($85), pay for government-regulated transportation to your hotel ($52) and then quarantine in a government-approved hotel (minimum $62/night) for 14 days. I made a reservation for only one night at the Cocoon Hotel in Quezon City ($78) in hopes that I could beg my way out of what I deemed to be an exceedingly long quarantine period for someone who already tested negative upon arrival. Those who tested positive were to be swooped away to a hospital and undergo a totally different set of rules.
Our flight arrived at 4:30 and by 6:30 a.m. I was checked in and settled in my hotel room. At 10:00, I received a message from Detoxicare, the company that did the swab test at the airport, that I had a negative result. Woohoo, perhaps the powers would let me go home!
My room at the Luxent Hotel was larger than standard hotel rooms. The best part was that I did not have to pay for it.
But that’s when trouble began. The front desk learned I was on quarantine and they said theirs was not a quarantine hotel and I couldn’t stay there. I said “What??! Your name’s on the list of government-approved facilities!” Regardless, they wanted me out of there right that moment because I could be a Covid carrier. I argued that I had just tested negative. No dice. I looked up to heaven and said, “Why, Lord, am I being kicked out of my hotel when all I did was come home Covid-free?”
I told Misjem, or so her name sounded, to give me names and numbers of people in government I could talk to about letting me go home. I could not flee because they had my number. I wanted to tell them I was a senior and too old to be isolated for a long period of time. I would assure them that I would lock myself up at home where I couldn’t contaminate anyone because I lived alone.
I ended up with a Miss Rimos from the Department of Tourism. She said I couldn’t go home, but they could put me in a government facility. I cringed. I had heard that those facilities were small, dirty, and had shared baths. I’d rather pay my last peso to not stay in one of those. Miss Rimos sounded kind though and asked why I refused. I said I had heard that their facilities were like Bilibid Prison. Her reaction was immediate. “Of course not! I’m offering you a decent and nice hotel!” Hmm. I asked which and she said the Luxent Hotel on Timog, which was just a few kilometers from home. I put her on hold while I googled Luxent. She was right.
But before I said yes, I threw her a bunch of questions: Would I have my own room with bath? What about meals – are you taking care of those too? And lastly, would you put your own mother in that room alone for 14 days?
When she responded with yes to all, I said okay, I would move the next day. “It’s free food and accommodation courtesy of our government po mam,” she emphasized. Suddenly the Cocoon Hotel was no longer in a hurry to get me out of their premises.
Luxent’s shuttle van picked me up the next day. I was handed a cardkey to room 1107. Nice two double-bed room that was larger than standard hotel rooms. It had a marble bathroom, minibar, and a great view of the iconic Tomas Morato monument and roundabout. I was happy until my first meal came in a box 6” x 6” and 1” high. In it was one small chicken drumstick, a sliver of cucumber, a sliver of tomato and about half a cup of rice. It came with a small bottle of water. Being on keto, I had the drumstick and left the rice untouched.
I had this same meal every day – morning, noon, and night – to the end of my stay. The only differences were that breakfast had about two tablespoons of scrambled eggs instead of vegetables and the drumstick was sometimes replaced with a matchbox sized beef or pork. I know beggars can’t be choosers, but that did not stop me from getting hungry.
“Against friends’ and family’s pleas to not go at this time because it was peak season for Covid-19 and California took the crown for being the hotbed of the pandemic, I went. ”
It was on my third day of isolation when yet again new rules for arriving passengers came down. We now needed to undergo a second swab test five days after arrival and, if negative, we could go home and finish our 14-day quarantine at home. Wheee! That was great news followed by another -- the Philippine Red Cross and Coast Guard would conduct the swabbing in our hotel free of charge. However, results would come between 24 and 48 hours, which means the soonest we could get out was seven or eight days after arrival.
Just before the 48-hour deadline, I received a text message confirming what I knew all along: I was negative for the Covid.
On January 29, eight full days after I arrived in Manila, I was finally free to go home. I was supposed to spend another six days quarantined at home, but new rules again came down. Starting February 1st, arriving passengers only had to be tested on the sixth day of arrival and if negative, they could go home a free person, thereby ending the mandatory 14-day rule. I had already done ten days under government control – the same number of days I quarantined voluntarily upon arrival in the US.
I am a citizen of both countries and both have different approaches to arresting the spread of Covid-19. I do not know which is working better for their populations, but I do know which one I’d rather live with.
“Lord, people ask me if my trip was worth the trouble. I say ‘Absolutely.’ I got to be with my best friends. I got to enjoy beautiful weather in one of the most beautiful cities in the world. I beat loneliness.
“Thank you, Lord.”
Bella Bonner
Bella Bonner is a journalism graduate of the UP Institute of Mass Communications. Among others, she worked as a grant writer and hotelier in Texas where she lived for 30 years. She has retired, returned to Manila and spends her days in sports, traveling and writing a personal blog, "Chicharon Diaries."
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