Thursday 26 March 2020

A virus arrived and we left

  • We were booked to go back to Melbourne and Hamilton for a holiday over Easter
  • The coronavirus started spreading and killing people
  • We were told we would have to stay in isolation on arrival in Australia for two weeks
  • The first case was announced in Tanzania
  • The police appeared on the streets wearing face masks
  • A second case was confirmed
  • Wednesday a week ago both our workplaces closed indefinitely
  • Another volunteer who lives in our compound self-isolated because she had flu-like symptoms
  • Someone reported her to the authorities
  • Health department authorities arrived and took a sample for testing

Not what you want to see in your compound
  • AVP announced that all 400 global volunteers were to go home to Australia as soon as possible
  • We got the AVP travel agent to book us flights for Monday - so now we had two options
  • One by one - various flights on our two options were cancelled and new options found
  • A couple of farewells with AVP colleagues who left earlier than us
  • Our original holiday flights home became impossible to use
  • Early on Monday our AVP booked flights were cancelled
  • By 1000 we were on our way to the airport with new Qatar Airlines tickets
So happy to see this chap arrive at Kilimanjaro airport to start us on our journey home.
  • Safely home Wednesday via Dar es Salam, Doha and Perth (41 hours door to door)
  • Now 14 days in isolation in Hamilton
Our sick volunteer colleague didn't have coronavirus and flew home on Tuesday.