No, that is not moron although I wonder….
So… Since our first post at about 9:30 this morning, there have been many ups and downs. Mostly downs – total, in the dumps, downs. As I said in the previous post, we “did experiments”. We went downstairs and attempted to get out of the building. We were definitively denied.
We spent a couple of hours in the flat. There is nothing that makes you want to get out more than being told you can’t. We’ve spent ENTIRE happy weekends never leaving the flat or the building – but my stress mounts exponentially now that I CANNOT leave whenever I want.
The University/Minsitry guys had said that a doctor would be coming back around 10:30am to finish collecting samples from all the people that were smart enough not to answer the door att 3am. Yes, those knocks were the Minsitry doctors.
We were just contemplating if it would be worse for our attempts to get out if we DID have the swabs done (with, of course, the chance that they could come back positive) or DID NOT get the swabs done (how likely is it that they have kept good enough records to KNOW who has been tested and who hasn’t) when the phone rang. It was the Ministry officials – “Miss, you must come downstairs IMMEDIATELY to have a test done. This is VERY IMPORTANT.”
Ok, apparently they HAVE kept records…. That was quite a surprise. We went and got throat swabbed. Most of the others were also smart enough to NOT answer the door at 3am. Many of the Egyptians didn’t understand…
We’ve now been locked in – and conscious of our containment – for about 8 hours. I am cranky and miffed and a bit concerned. Mostly cranky and miffed, because I’m not convinced that what they are doing is really going to help AT ALL.
Luckily for us, they are allowing deliveries (like ~200 Pizza Hut mini-pizzas, supplied by Student Housing), so if this drags on, as it seems it will, at least we can eat.