Welcome to the Soviet State of Victoria
Let me be clear from the outset, that Australia has done an admirable job in responding to the Corona pandemic and Victoria was traumatized by initial screw-ups so has gone overboard. I get it.
BUT
The experience of entering into Australia on Friday night was a mix of absurdist comedy and something much darker.
We landed at Tulla at 11.05 p.m. on a Friday night. The cabin crew received permission to open the doors at 11.30. No explanations for the extra 25 minutes after 13 hours in the air. I was actually surprised we don’t go full retro, with the men in tight shorts spraying Mortein or Pine-O-Clean throughout the plane. The older Australians will understand.
At any rate, we deplaned and immediately happened upon the first of the 14 stations of the Via Dolorosa that allowed us entry into the Promised Land (you’ll excuse my very mixed religious metaphors). Plane masks in the bin, new masks and mandatory ecogel on the hands. Very sensible. Next station, temperature. Don’t worry, I’m not going to list all the stations. I couldn’t remember them all if I tried.
What became quickly apparent was that the Victorian government has solved the Covid unemployment problem by employing hundreds of people at the airport. I may have had actual contact with “only” 20 Covid related people, but I am certain that I saw at least 200 people hanging around looking at us, from the time I got off the plane until the moment I entered my quarantine hotel room. What those 180 smiling (I think, behind double masks), hazchem suited people actually did remains a state secret. They weren’t doing airport/immigration stuff. That’s for sure. Maybe they play tag-team in helping the bewildered landees.
After a few more stations, questionnaires, and rows of hazchems, pointing us in the right direction, we got to baggage claim. When Corona is finished, how will people find their way to baggage claim without having the numerous smiling assistants showing us the way? I don’t know how on earth we managed before Corona.
Whilst standing and waiting for my luggage a cheery hazchem asked me if I’d filled out a Victorian Government Entry Form, or a VGEF. No, I had merely filled a covid declaration, Australian Customs entry form and an Australian Government request for permission for entry into Australia. “oh no”, continued the chirpy hazchem,”you need to fill out a VGEF as well.” No problem. Ink is cheap and the tree has been cut down already. I filled out the form. And that was it. No one actually asked me to show them the form. It was never presented and it remains with me in my luggage bag. The filling out of the form is what was important.
Once I had collected my bags and they’d been sprayed with disinfectant, we were all shepherded by a gaggle of hazchems and armed guards to the bus, where for the 3rd time in an hour we had a rules sheet read to us. The reader started by giving us his name, which department gave him the authority to stand before us and then he pointed to a badge on his hip, which I assume was his official badge, but could have been his bus pass, or a credit card. What’s the point of pointing to a bit of plastic on your hip when no-one can actually see what it is? That isn’t identification. It’s bluff. Or buffoonery.
The identical declarations all told us that we were going to quarantine and we had no choice. As if we didn’t know already. What few words I could identify through the double masks were “punishment” “fines” “compliance” and “compulsory”. We were also continually warned that photography was forbidden. My guess was so they couldn’t be ridiculed on social media. It seemed very clear that a) we were morons and b) it was futile to object. Disney coated Sovietism.
Have you heard of the concept of social distancing? We heard it often as we passed from station to station. Fair enough, too. Seems like they forgot it when it comes to the bus. 40 passengers sat shoulder to shoulder in the back half of the bus. I had a lady sitting next to me, 10 cm away and a couple in front of me, 20 cm away. And we sat like that, very social and undistanced, for 30 minutes before the bus actually left the airport. Why? Because they couldn’t find the police escort. John Cleese was jealous that he hadn’t put it into a Monty Python sketch. A bunch of hostile returning citizens needed police escort from Tulla to town to ensure they didn’t overpower the hapless driver and set of for Mooroopna. Eventually they found the escort and we were off. We drove around the tarmac in circles, sort of like a miniature plane, before takeoff through an armoured gate and on to the freeway.
Upon arriving to our hotel the bus driver opened the door. Seems natural to me. No. He was told very sternly to close the door until he was instructed to open it. Then he was instructed to open it. There were about 15 hazchems waiting for our arrival, I guess to prevent us from succeeding in running off to Mooroopna, since the police escort had thwarted our initial attempts. As if. Two hazchems had orange vests on and they were charged with perusing the perimeter of the parked bus, clipboard inhand, sort of like inspecting a hire car for nicks, dents and scratches before you take delivery of it.
Once the Riot Act was read to us for one last time, in case we didn’t understand the three pervious times, which we didn’t, because we couldn’t hear it properly, we were allowed off the bus, one at a time. It only took 30 minutes. The time was 2.00 a.m. after an 11.00 p.m. landing.
By 2.45 I was in my very nice room at the very nice hotel where I will be eating very nice food, over these next 14 days. Or 336 hours. Or 20,160 minutes. Or 1,209,600 seconds. But who’s counting?