If you were to reconnect with the person you were at the time Covid-19 was declared a pandemic on March 11, 2020, would you have dared to believe that the world would be more complicated today than it was back then?
It is virtually impossible to argue that we live in easier times now, given the unceasing conflict in Gaza, which has claimed tens of thousands of lives since the October 7 attacks on Israel. The contours of conflict also run through Lebanon, where a Hamas commander was killed in the south of the country on Wednesday, and through Yemen, where the Houthis continue to attack and disrupt global shipping. Sudan’s warring parties flexed their muscles again this week. Further afield, the Ukraine war has entered its third year and Haiti has experienced a new round of violence. Conflict simmers and boils all around the world.
But, back then in March 2020, when World Health Organisation director general Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said that his organisation was “deeply concerned both by the alarming levels of spread and severity” and declared a pandemic, it felt that this was a moment in history that was without equal or precedent.
The collaborative novel Fourteen Days, published last month by Chatto and Windus, which is set over two weeks of the first period of the pandemic, provides persistent reminders of that period, of which the anniversary is upon us again.
It charts the experiences of a group of New Yorkers “left behind” in the city in the grandly named but thoroughly downtrodden Fernsby Arms, a tenement building that has survived long past its sell-by date. The volume is edited by Margaret Atwood and Douglas Preston, and features contributions from John Grisham, Emma Donoghue, Dave Eggers, Sylvia Day, Atwood and many more.
We may have clung to the idea that a short sharp shock was all that was needed before life returned to normal. It turned out to be a far longer journey
As the pandemic progresses, the building’s occupants gather on its roof each evening and the reader slowly slips back into the lingua franca of 2020 with its clapping for carers, the practice of deliberate social distancing and even the binge-watching of Netflix’s Tiger King, released just as the world was shutting down.
The book is, as a note at the beginning articulates, an attempt to “make sense of the senseless and bring order to disorder”. Critics have called it a mixed bag, as befits a multi-author effort, and an “enjoyable product of an unenjoyable time”. It’s both, but it’s also a time capsule and an aide memoire to the reader to recall their own pandemic experiences.
As a loose piece of historical fiction, Fourteen Days sent this reader back to what was happening in this country at that time. In the UAE, schools had been placed on early spring break recess at the beginning of March 2020 and public places were being gradually closed. The government announced the first of a series of economic stimulus packages in mid-March 2020. Response mechanisms were being mobilised by the hour.
There were less than 500 cases in the country at that point, but as the WHO’s Dr Tedros had said the week earlier about the direction the world was heading in, “we have rung the alarm bell loud and clear”. All passenger flights were halted to and from the UAE from March 25, 2020. The world was shutting down.
The last picture I have on my phone from an all but empty Khalifa Park newsroom in Abu Dhabi is a snatched frame taken on the same day as the first mandatory shelter-in-place orders were about to be introduced. There is an end-of-era feeling about the image. It would be months before we returned.
Returning to 2024, on the anniversary of the Wuhan lockdown in January, this newspaper asked whether we would ever see a return to similar-style measures? The unsigned leader that answered that question was written amid concerns about the existence of Disease X and following comments made by Dr Tedros about pandemic preparedness at the World Economic Forum in Davos. Our editorial concluded that “the 2020 Wuhan lockdown is a warning from history, and it is up to all of us to learn the lessons from those dark days”.
As the title of Fourteen Days hints at, back then we may have clung to the idea that a short sharp shock was all that was needed before life returned to normal. It turned out to be a far longer journey with far more bumps on the road than had been anticipated. Not many would ever argue the case for blanket lockdowns in the future.
The pandemic was not deemed to be “over” by the WHO until May last year. That was an announcement made without fanfare and will almost certainly be an anniversary that passes unnoticed in a few weeks from now.
That is how it should be. There is too much else to be concerned about in the world right now.
The candidates
Dr Ayham Ammora, scientist and business executive
Ali Azeem, business leader
Tony Booth, professor of education
Lord Browne, former BP chief executive
Dr Mohamed El-Erian, economist
Professor Wyn Evans, astrophysicist
Dr Mark Mann, scientist
Gina MIller, anti-Brexit campaigner
Lord Smith, former Cabinet minister
Sandi Toksvig, broadcaster
Company%C2%A0profile
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F1 The Movie
Starring: Brad Pitt, Damson Idris, Kerry Condon, Javier Bardem
Director: Joseph Kosinski
Rating: 4/5
Three tips from La Perle's performers
1 The kind of water athletes drink is important. Gwilym Hooson, a 28-year-old British performer who is currently recovering from knee surgery, found that out when the company was still in Studio City, training for 12 hours a day. “The physio team was like: ‘Why is everyone getting cramps?’ And then they realised we had to add salt and sugar to the water,” he says.
2 A little chocolate is a good thing. “It’s emergency energy,” says Craig Paul Smith, La Perle’s head coach and former Cirque du Soleil performer, gesturing to an almost-empty open box of mini chocolate bars on his desk backstage.
3 Take chances, says Young, who has worked all over the world, including most recently at Dragone’s show in China. “Every time we go out of our comfort zone, we learn a lot about ourselves,” she says.
SPEC SHEET
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Processor: 4nm Snapdragon 8 Gen 1/Exynos 2200, 8-core
Memory: 8/12GB RAM
Storage: 128/256/512GB/1TB
Platform: Android 12
Main camera: quad 12MP ultra-wide f/2.2, 108MP wide f/1.8, 10MP telephoto f/4.9, 10MP telephoto 2.4; Space Zoom up to 100x, auto HDR, expert RAW
Video: 8K@24fps, 4K@60fps, full-HD@60fps, HD@30fps, super slo-mo@960fps
Front camera: 40MP f/2.2
Battery: 5000mAh, fast wireless charging 2.0 Wireless PowerShare
Connectivity: 5G, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 5.2, NFC
I/O: USB-C
SIM: single nano, or nano and SIM, nano and nano, eSIM/nano and nano
Colours: burgundy, green, phantom black, phantom white, graphite, sky blue, red
Price: Dh4,699 for 128GB, Dh5,099 for 256GB, Dh5,499 for 512GB; 1TB unavailable in the UAE
The five pillars of Islam
1. Fasting
2. Prayer
3. Hajj
4. Shahada
5. Zakat
Company profile
Company name: Suraasa
Started: 2018
Founders: Rishabh Khanna, Ankit Khanna and Sahil Makker
Based: India, UAE and the UK
Industry: EdTech
Initial investment: More than $200,000 in seed funding
Retail gloom
Online grocer Ocado revealed retail sales fell 5.7 per cen in its first quarter as customers switched back to pre-pandemic shopping patterns.
It was a tough comparison from a year earlier, when the UK was in lockdown, but on a two-year basis its retail division, a joint venture with Marks&Spencer, rose 31.7 per cent over the quarter.
The group added that a 15 per cent drop in customer basket size offset an 11.6. per cent rise in the number of customer transactions.
More on Quran memorisation:
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
Specs
Engine: 51.5kW electric motor
Range: 400km
Power: 134bhp
Torque: 175Nm
Price: From Dh98,800
Available: Now
The years Ramadan fell in May
Match info
Uefa Champions League Group F
Manchester City v Hoffenheim, midnight (Wednesday, UAE)
Sole survivors
- Cecelia Crocker was on board Northwest Airlines Flight 255 in 1987 when it crashed in Detroit, killing 154 people, including her parents and brother. The plane had hit a light pole on take off
- George Lamson Jr, from Minnesota, was on a Galaxy Airlines flight that crashed in Reno in 1985, killing 68 people. His entire seat was launched out of the plane
- Bahia Bakari, then 12, survived when a Yemenia Airways flight crashed near the Comoros in 2009, killing 152. She was found clinging to wreckage after floating in the ocean for 13 hours.
- Jim Polehinke was the co-pilot and sole survivor of a 2006 Comair flight that crashed in Lexington, Kentucky, killing 49.
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T10 Cricket League
Sharjah Cricket Stadium
December 14- 17
6pm, Opening ceremony, followed by:
Bengal Tigers v Kerala Kings
Maratha Arabians v Pakhtoons
Tickets available online at q-tickets.com/t10
The biog
Name: Younis Al Balooshi
Nationality: Emirati
Education: Doctorate degree in forensic medicine at the University of Bonn
Hobbies: Drawing and reading books about graphic design
The National in Davos
We are bringing you the inside story from the World Economic Forum's Annual Meeting in Davos, a gathering of hundreds of world leaders, top executives and billionaires.
The Word for Woman is Wilderness
Abi Andrews, Serpent’s Tail
Mia Man’s tips for fermentation
- Start with a simple recipe such as yogurt or sauerkraut
- Keep your hands and kitchen tools clean. Sanitize knives, cutting boards, tongs and storage jars with boiling water before you start.
- Mold is bad: the colour pink is a sign of mold. If yogurt turns pink as it ferments, you need to discard it and start again. For kraut, if you remove the top leaves and see any sign of mold, you should discard the batch.
- Always use clean, closed, airtight lids and containers such as mason jars when fermenting yogurt and kraut. Keep the lid closed to prevent insects and contaminants from getting in.
RACE CARD
4.30pm: Maiden Dh80,000 1,400m
5pm: Conditions Dh80,000 1,400m
5.30pm: Liwa Oasis Group 3 Dh300,000 1,400m
6pm: The President’s Cup Listed Dh380,000 1,400m
6.30pm: Arabian Triple Crown Group 2 Dh300,000 2,200m
7pm: Wathba Stallions Cup Handicap (30-60) Dh80,000 1,600m
7.30pm: Handicap (40-70) Dh80,000 1,600m.
Our House, Louise Candlish,
Simon & Schuster
Our legal consultants
Name: Hassan Mohsen Elhais
Position: legal consultant with Al Rowaad Advocates and Legal Consultants.
The biog
Name: Samar Frost
Born: Abu Dhabi
Hobbies: Singing, music and socialising with friends
Favourite singer: Adele
