TheMooreStory

Life experiences, critical thinking, recipes, and ancestry

Author: Vikashni (Page 2 of 2)

I am a woman in my forties navigating life's many challenges, including not being able to have children and being a minority in every other sense. Have a look at my stories.

Where the heart is – Fiji Day 2020

10 October 2020 /

On the waves of the ocean, I whispered,

In the tropical rain, I danced.

On the sandy beaches, the crabs I chased.

In the sweltering heat, I dreamed.                                                                                             – In Fiji: My poem

The Fiji Islands, commonly called just Fiji, are made up of more than 300 islands. Today is Fiji Day, a day that marks the anniversary of both the country’s cession to and its independence from the British. As a tribute to my homeland’s 50th independence anniversary, some of my fellow Fijians share what Fiji means to us, to take you on a virtual journey of our island home.

What is Fiji to me? From the Guest Contributors (residents in Fiji and those now living elsewhere):

I am blessed to have two homes. But Fiji is my first home. A home that created beautiful and loving memories. Memories of my brother, my parents, us together as a small happy family; cream buns and all the yummy Fiji food…and of course friends. I know in my heart that no matter what, those small set of friendships founded in Fiji have now become lifelong friends

The beautiful sandy beaches, the blue crystal waters, the kindness, the taste of fresh coconut water, the Fijian food, the beautiful Bula smiles…Fiji is our home and it is where the heart is at peace

Fiji to me is my whole identity. It is my motherland and it has shaped who I am today. It’s only when I am back there that I know I am in my true element, that I am home

I love my beautiful island. No matter how far I travel, when I touch down on Fijian soil, the sight, the smells, the smiles, the songs, the humidity…it means I am home. When people ask me where I come from, proudly I quip ‘Fiji’…They go – are you really Fijian, your hair is straight, your complexion different, even your accent…”. I go – “Yes, loud and proud Fijian”. We have come so far in our 50 years and sometimes people still see us as Indian, I don’t know much about India, I have never been. But I can tell you so much about my beautiful island that I almost sound like a destination advertisement…anyone who is a coconut can relate to that…I am Fijian and I love Fiji

Fiji for me is motherland, no matter how far, this relationship does not change. I am and always will be a Fijian, no matter where I am

For me, Fiji is simply a nation vibrant with so many cultures…founded and grounded on God’s Word

Fiji is not just a home but a paradise that was built with blood, sweat and tears. It represents the sacrifice of our forefathers who paved the way to give us a better future. Fiji is not just a place; it is the reason for my existence. Even though I may be many miles away, I will always be a child to my motherland

When I think of Fiji, I feel warmth. Warmth of the sun, warmth of the sea, warmth of the people. A destination defined by tropical natural beauty. I was lucky to spend three months in Fiji…immersing myself in the culture with the welcoming locals…I long to go back and further explore Fiji and her incredible islands with sand the colour of a baby’s skin and sea the colour of the matching sky. Will I be able to leave this time?

And of course, the final word from this diasporic Fijian😉. While you are in the Fiji Islands, you feel something special. You find a unique blend of some 15 ethnicities and cultures – we are not just Kaiviti (indigenous Fijian), or Kaindia (Fijian Indian) or Kaivalagi (European), Kailoma (what we call the ‘part’ or ‘in between’) or Chinese or Rotuman or Gilbertese (and the list goes on and on)…but we are Fijian – the one integrated whole made from many. Our food, our language, our culture is a beautiful, vibrant mix that you cannot pin down to that one thing…except for Rugby Sevens and cream buns!

You will also find a unique mix of those who are happy with what may seem little in material wealth. You will find the vulnerable who are incredibly strong. You will experience the resilience of a people, who get up each time they are knocked down by whatever nature throws their way (devastating cyclones, floods, effects of global warming), dressed in our Sunday best with a song in our hearts. You will find the poor who are rich in heart. Fiji is more than just a few dots in the Pacific Ocean, more than the Bulas and heart-warming smiles, more than the coconuts, beaches, and palm trees. To me, Fiji is every Fijian’s way of life.

Despite our hardships we smile and sing,

Despite our global smallness, we are big at heart,

Despite everything that comes our way, we remain resilient.

Despite the world falling apart around us, we see everything the world could be.

The country lives in every Fijian out there. Vinaka Viti.

Vinaka Vakalevu and Loloma to all guest contributors – you know who you are.

Loloma

Simple joys in life, with a cardboard toboggan

5 October 2020 /

Today, a Monday, I was most unproductive at work. It almost felt like I was on holiday. The thoughts in my head just would not stick. I was here, there, everywhere. Taught my class and it was over even before I knew it. Got into the lift and was so immersed in a conversation with someone that I forgot to key in the floor we were going to – the conversation so good combined with my head in the clouds, not that there were any in the Auckland sky today. I even came home earlier than usual and spent some of the afternoon in the garden. Work can and will wait. Because this weekend’s effects are still lingering.

It started with running up North Head in Devonport with the two kids of one of my closest friends on Saturday. They are 10 and 12 years old and me, well, most of you know my age. According to my friend, I had found my ‘gang’. And yes, it felt natural to sprint up a hill, several times, in competition with (and winning, of course, have you met me yet?!) two kids who play rugby and soccer in their respective local clubs. I watched these kids’ smiles and their simple take on life – “I am hungry, I need to run, please take a photo, dark tunnels – yikes, let’s leave Mummy here!” It was hilarious watching them try to navigate their way downhill on a makeshift grass toboggan, aka a piece of cardboard😊.

Now, where I come from, you just get on the cardboard and let go. Deal with the bruises and maybe broken bones later. Children these days are more cautious. Good on them. The 10-year old managed to get all the way downhill in the end, after a lot of coaxing and small accomplishments along the way. Sprinting uphill and tumbling downhill was of course not enough so walking on rocks on Devonport beach was also thrown into the mix (with grown up kid leading the way). Caught up in the moments of careful rock-stepping, we missed the great spectacle of fish having a high jump competition in the water behind us.

Almost seamlessly, the same energy and buzz flowed into another day, spent in the company of another set of close friends – my adopted family. Having got together to remember our collective losses of loved ones this year and funerals that could not be attended, I found myself immersed in yet another afternoon that was filled was laughter, love, and food. I did not want that day to end. It was one of the best weekends so far this year.

I wonder what life would be without these moments. Maybe I am getting sentimental in my old age (!). No matter what – a pandemic, a bleak economy, upcoming elections and referendums with the dilemmas of who and what to vote for, job losses, bank funds running dry…all the highs, and the lows of this year – we can still find happiness in the smallest things, and the smallest things make the most difference.

Today, when my head is still in the clouds in a cloudless sky, all I want to write about is the simple joys in life. It is the friend who looks to you as their moral compass. It is the 2-year old who scrapes her knees on your driveway and runs to your arms for comfort. It is the letting-go feeling when sliding downhill on a piece of cardboard. It is the singing of a song (out of tune and being told so by your friends) to a little baby.

It is the comfort in knowing that no matter what, you have a little place in the world.

Mental health – the darkness that daylight savings cannot lighten

27 September 2020 /

Today in NZ our clocks have moved forward by an hour. We now have more time in the light. The hours of darkness are gradually becoming shorter.

I think of light and darkness, and mental health, simultaneously. The World Mental Health Day is on October 10. Last week was Mental Health Awareness week in NZ. Per usual, we are again ahead of the rest of the world 😊.

When I was about to publish the first article on my blog site, a friend of mine said I should also write about the effects of lockdowns on mental health. I could not tell him that I was battling it myself, and would rather not write about it, just then. The thing about mental health problems is that we do not want to talk about them – be they our own or the problems of those we love and know. The number of ‘cases’ do not get reported on a daily basis in front of an audience on a podium. Covid-19 and lockdowns might have exacerbated the challenges with mental health but the issue was there long before Covid-19 and sadly will be around long after. No billions of dollars of investment or promises of vaccines.

Maybe we all struggle with overwhelming feelings sometimes. Maybe we have escaped from them our entire lives. I find that on occasions their grip on me is so strong that even my husband, the one who knows me best, cannot get through the walls of darkness that entrap me.

For when you are down, you are in the depths of darkness.

Some people sadly never come out of it. Some people struggle without knowing it. Some run away, sometimes literally, from loved ones who want to support them. Some do not say a word and pretend that they are ok.

Mental health is not only an issue for those who suffer from it, but also for those whose lives get affected by it. Because some, in their loving and supporting roles, end up being the most bruised and hurt.

Those stories are not mine to tell. But we all can find those stories, if we try.

Because even with the extra hours of light, we have in our midst those whose hours of darkness fail to get shorter.

Playing cat and mouse

20 September 2020 /

It is a wonderfully sun-filled late afternoon. I feel spring is here and summer is already on its way, on the back of a mild winter. The bougainvillea in our garden did not stop flowering all through autumn and winter and today I spotted more flowers on this massive wall climbing plant. As I think of summer, I am reminded of a day many summers ago, when we first moved into our current home. With a new garden to re-do and fill with colour, I set about spending most of my days digging, weeding, planting, watering, hours at the garden centres, carrying heavy soil bags from the boot of the car to the bottom of our garden…Back then when my husband was always on a plane. I also remember the one afternoon I stood in my garden and watched a grey cat (not ours) spring out of nowhere onto a helpless little sparrow, who was innocently feeding on some seeds I had left on the ground.

That day, the grey cat knew I was watching, or so I think. It held the sparrow in its mouth and looked at me, in triumph, as I looked back at in horror. Trembling, I started to cry while the cat victoriously marched through my garden, sparrow held in place, jumped over the fence and into a neighbouring garden. Afterwards I told one of my friends all about the horror I had witnessed. She reassured me that it was just nature taking its course…cats are supposed to eat birds, the whole eco system thing, blah blah blah. The rational part of my brain knew she was right. The other part, let’s not call it irrational for a moment, said to my friend, inaudibly, ‘But you don’t know what this cat is like. It is paying me back.’

Now, for those of you who know me really well, having invited me to your home and sat in bewilderment, perhaps, following a conversation that played out somewhat like this: “Me: Do you have cats at home? You: Yes. Me: Umm…I cannot come, unless the cats are not there…I’m scared of cats”, you know what I mean. I am absolutely petrified of cats. No use asking me what it is about cats that makes me feel that way. I just do…feel that way.

I see a cat and it sees me. We have a conversation.

It (almost always a she, for I have no clue how to differentiate between a male and female cat because I have never been brave enough to get close enough to tell the difference) says to me “Ahhh, I have got you cornered you now. Everyone around here loves me; they love rubbing my belly when I roll on my back, they think I am cute…and then they look at you – the weird one – because you are shit scared of me.”

I retort “Well, I have no desire to rub your belly or any part of you. Get out of my garden.”

It/She does not budge. Sits on the grass and continues to demonise me. It/She knows I am scared, petrified…and seems to be enjoying every moment of it. A lick of its/her fur, another look at me, then looks away at my birds, eyes back on me as if to say “I’m gonna get your birds today…and you some day”. Smirk on its/her face. Eventually, I leave the cat to its musings and retreat inside my house. I toss and turn in bed for nights on end. I have cat nightmares – they jump on my bed, rub themselves against my legs…Oh God! I wake up screaming, panting, unable to sleep anymore. The new home experience is not so nice anymore.

So, one day, after a prolonged cat and mouse game (me the mouse obviously), I set out on a mission. I buy some water squirters from the 2-dollar shop. At the garden centre, I buy cat alarms. I am ashamed to say that I was reduced to using a ‘weapon’ to get this predator out of my garden. This was after having consulted with a few cat owners, who said they did not mind their cat being ‘sprayed with water if it annoys you’. “Sprayed, not gunned” my conscience yells.  “Hush”, I yell back in return, “it is after all only water, not bullets…kids squirt each other with it all the time!”

Equipped with my ’deterrents’, I triumphantly go about setting up the alarms all afternoon. The alarm system is designed to scare cats away with a high pitched sound that only cats can hear, and hopefully chase them away. It cannot come and spoil the freshly dug up soil then. Three alarms for now. Check. Water squirters, filled with water, check. I sleep easy that night.

Next day I wait in the garden. Keeping busy (to the ordinary eye) with more soil digging, but really waiting for my nemesis to show up. So I can have it out with it/her. Planting, digging, planting, waiting…the grey cat is about, I can feel it in my bones. All day I wait. It does not come. Of course, I have to go to work at some point and I do. I check on the garden every afternoon. No signs of the cat. Until day five. It/She appears out of nowhere, making me jump out of my skin. But I play it cool this time. I do not stand frozen on the spot. I look at it/her, it/she looks at me. I say, “I don’t care about you being here, do what you like.” I walk away. It looks almost angry at my lack of fearful response. Ha! I have the upper hand now, I think. I walk quietly to the garage to retrieve a water squirter. Hiding it behind my back, I walk back in the garden. It/she is still there, waiting to paralyse me with fear. A swish of its tail…sends shivers down my spine. We lock eyes. I cannot feel my legs. Hold your ground, I say to myself. Be brave.

I slowly raise the squirter and aim at the cat. I miss the target, not just miss, but miss by a long shot. But it does something to the cat. It knows this weapon. It can tell I am on a war path. It runs for its life. Meanwhile, I stand there shaking to my core. I have never used a ‘weapon’ of any sort. And I think my conscience gave a huge sigh of relief when I missed my target.

The cat did not forget the encounter though. Oh no, you bet it did not. It came back, a week later. It hid under the deck and waited until I fed the birds. It waited until I was right near the edge of the deck under which it was hiding. And then it jumped on the innocent sparrow and crushed the poor bird in its mouth, simultaneously crushing my recently found but shaky confidence in the fight against fear (of cats). Oh, it got me. And it got me well. Payback for an off-target water squirter attempt, but payback, nonetheless.

I am not a cruel, animal hurting person by the way. I have fed and watered some neighbours’ cats (cats which I have got accustomed to), from a distance of course. But the other cats in our neighbourhood (minus the neighbours’ ones) still scare me to death and I have not done any harm to any of them. I sit uneasily at anyone’s home where a cat is on the prowl. I jump when it approaches me and in doing so accidentally break any dishes, cups or glasses that happen to be in the way. Or when the cat is a good distance away but within sight, I pretend I am listening to the conversations around me, when all the time I am having other conversations in my head. I am sweating profusely. Heart throbbing. Mind in a panicked state, a nonstop buzz…conjuring up pictures over and over again of the animal pouncing on me, scratching my skin, my eyes, biting me, rubbing itself all over me. Shivers down my spine do not adequately describe my phobia, the paranoia. Somehow all the cats who come in contact with me can look inside my soul and know how I am feeling, and I do believe they love taunting me. I know a cat cannot kill me. I am not a little sparrow that a cat can hold in its mouth and squash to its death. I am not even scared of death by a cat. It is just…a phobia. An irrational (there, I admit it!) fear.

“Oh Viks, the poor thing is more scared of you than you are of it”. True. Maybe. But when I look at the cat and it looks back at me, we have a different conversation altogether, just the two of us. I remain the mouse.

Refugees remain the Uninvited in the midst of Covid

12 September 2020 /

“All of us impatient for sunrise, all of us in dread of it. All of us in search of home…I have heard it said we are the uninvited. We are the unwelcome. We should take our misfortune elsewhere.” – An unnamed refugee father speaking to his sleeping son in Khaled Hosseini’s Sea Prayer

Refugees are people who flee not just from war and armed conflict, they flee from all types of injustices, including gender-based crimes and crimes against children. They try to escape from countries where natural disasters devastate their lives and livelihoods, from countries where having an opinion against a dominant culture, group or government is punished. And they face/survive far more atrocious things than Covid.

The vast majority of the world’s refugees end up in what is commonly known as the ‘developing countries’. There were 30 million refugees and asylum seekers globally at the end of 2019 and less than 1% were resettled in First world countries last year. NZ promised to resettle 1500 refugees annually from 2020. Last year we promised an intake of 1000 refugees but resettled only 800. This year, we had one intake of roughly 100 people (without making up for last year’s shortfall of 200). And then Covid happened. The resettlement programme got suspended, along with the hopes, dreams and plans of the remaining 1400 people looking forward to rebuilding their lives here.

Refugees survive in camps, in slums in developing counties, on food handouts and rations, with limited access to water, medicine, education, resorting to all sorts of ‘work’. They already battle malnutrition, malaria, respiratory diseases, measles…The threats to life they encounter are far too many to note down on this single page. Now, they too, live alongside Covid. I would like to believe that we inhabit a just world, but refugees remain in places where they are susceptible to Covid as well, while we live in our national cocoon.

The UNHCR and International Organisation for Migration suspended all refugee resettlement programmes in March 2020 but uplifted the suspension in June 2020. At that point in time NZ was revelling in Covid-free joy. Yet, we did not resume the refugee resettlement programme. We are by far one of the best countries in the world in terms of dealing with Covid. But apparently we do not have the confidence in our health care and testing systems to bring in a very small percentage of one of the world’s most vulnerable at a time when they need us the most…when the same systems function for the 400-odd people who arrive daily at our borders. Refugees do not need hotels for managed quarantine. The Mangere Resettlement Centre has functioned for years as THE place where new refugees go when they arrive, and where they remain for 6 weeks, isolated from the rest of NZ (even during pre-Covid times), while they learn about life in NZ. The infrastructure is in place. The Covid tagline “We are in this together” appears to apply to New Zealanders only. I thought as a country we were more inclusive than that.

Perhaps only our First World lives are more important…

Yes, there is a global crisis that is Covid. Yes, there have been 28.4 million cases of Covid worldwide, and yes, of these 19.4 million have so far recovered. The count of 30 million refugees and asylum seekers keeps increasing. We do not know how many die, unnamed and unaccounted for, each day. Which is, and has been, the bigger crisis? Where is our humanitarian spirit, our humanity?

On the topic of life and death…the perilous sea crossing in Hosseini’s tribute to refugees who have died on such journeys is but one of the many threats to life they encounter. While I live in enforced isolation, I think of the unnamed millions dreading the sunrise. I think that their displaced lives speak more of strength, hope, and resilience than our closed borders do. And I feel immensely sad that we get so concerned with ourselves, we become so inward-looking, that we lose sight of the fact that all lives matter…that there are bigger problems than Covid which continue to plague our world.

The pandemics of inequalities and exclusion are very much alive.

See more:

http://themoorestory.com/index.php/2020/08/30/elimination-isolationist/

http://themoorestory.com/index.php/2020/08/23/what-will-be-our-global-message/

Covid Elimination strategy New Zealand and isolationism

30 August 2020 /

This week I have been immersed in marking student assignments…one of the perks of teaching! We follow a simple principle for student handback – give feedback and feedforward. The feedforward is aimed to give students advice/hints on how to improve their work and provoke thoughts around other possibilities. In my last post, I left some thoughts hanging about the ‘new’ new normal, and after hearing comments from some of those who read the blog (thank you!), I realise that it is hard to imagine a way forward when we are constantly being fed the elimination rhetoric.

Feedback. During the 100 days or so of being Covid-free and living lives as pre-Covid times, we stopped thinking about things like social distancing and hand sanitisers and masks and tests. When the world outside of our borders broadcast news of their ongoing battles with Covid, it seemed surreal, almost as if we were on a different planet…counting our lucky stars while at it. I had conversations where people invariably said they had forgotten lockdown life.

I remember walking into Devonport Chocolates shop a few weeks before lockdown round 2 and seeing a sad-looking bottle of hand sanitiser on a chair outside the front door, sitting on top of a sign that read “Sign in, stop the virus” – that infamous black and yellow Covid tracer card! I debated with myself whether I should use the hand sanitiser, but then thought, “I’m clean, and flipping heck, we are Covid-free”. So, in I went, without signing in and sanitising. The lady in the shop served me with a smile. It’s not her’s/the shop’s fault.

Feedforward. The elimination rhetoric drives the risk of complacency, as we all start to believe and think that elimination has been achieved. But if the messaging from our country managers was more about how to live with the pandemic going forward, we might behave differently. Right now, we are so focused on elimination that we are not looking towards what lies ahead, in the long-term. I think it’s time to wake up and smell the coffee…to recognise that we are part of a global community here, everyone in the world is battling against Covid.

And if “Team NZ” (not my words) is really a team, then we need to be allowed to behave like adults, as members of a team. So that the next time I go into Devonport Chocolates, or any other retailer, without signing in, wearing a mask and sanitising, the staff should feel empowered to not serve me and ask me to leave the shop.

We hear lots of talk about simple messaging. Well, let’s do just that. Let’s have simple, clear rules and consequences around alert levels and not hover, in uncertainty, between levels i.e. the X.5 level. Good leadership demonstrates what good behaviour looks like, long-term. If wearing a mask all the time when in public is the right thing to do, I should feel ashamed not to wear one, and more importantly, I should be aware/fearful of the consequences. Much like the drunk driver has consequences to face for not adhering to the rules.

The alternative is, of course, to continue to isolate, yo-yo-lockdown-style, as individuals and as a country. Our old people already feel isolated. How much longer do we subject them to a world without hugs and visitors and not having loved ones around in their hour of need? And elimination creates the tendency to isolate from the rest of the world.  

After lockdown round 1, I embarked on a curiosity-driven research project within my friends circle, soliciting their views about their lockdown experiences (feedback) and what they thought life would be like going forward (feedforward). My responses were not included in the research project but I shared my views with the participant group. This is what I had said about my feedforward, and for once in my life, I would have liked to be wrong:

“Going forward – is it really going to be a new world that we inhabit post-lockdown/Covid-19? I don’t know how long the acts of kindness around the world will continue. I sense and fear a new wave of isolationist-driven hate speech and actions, against immigrants, refugees, the outsiders – those who (are accused of )‘bring(ing) in or breed(ing)’ illnesses and unwanted what-nots, according to those who want to protect their lands and people. Maybe I am a cynic…” (Vikashni, 10 May, 2020).

Our elimination rhetoric is taking us down a very slippery path. The elimination-leading-to-isolationist actions make us equal to, dare I say it, the Brexiters and Trump supporters. If we are not careful, we will become just like these people…while proudly wearing our Elimination badge. Let us, instead, think about other possibilities.

See more:

http://themoorestory.com/index.php/2020/08/23/what-will-be-our-global-message/

http://themoorestory.com/index.php/2020/09/12/the-uninvited/

Why pursue Covid elimination when it is here to stay?

23 August 2020 /

I have a set of candles that we use on birthday cakes. These candles re-light themselves a few seconds after they are blown out, much to the embarrassment of the birthday person, while the onlookers burst into streams of laughter as the birthday person attempts, time after time, to extinguish the flame and get on with cutting the cake. Last month my mother happened to be the latest victim and she was out of breath after a few attempts. I sent the video of my poor mum giving up and me laughing out loud all through the video to my friends. One of them recently said to me “Covid is like that re-lighting candle”.

We are in the second weekend of Level 3 lockdown, round 2. And you wonder, if ordinary people think that way about Covid, why does our government insist on eliminating it? Surely, what has happened globally is a testament to the fact that Covid is here to stay, much like our cancers, the common cold and flu, the road accidents…all these things that kill people but we learn to live with it. Isn’t it the wiser thing to say, ‘hey – let’s find a way to live with this thing until we have a cure’?

Obviously, I do not like lockdown the second time around, and no, I did not take part in the recent anti-lockdown protest in Auckland. Back in March, a lockdown was novel, indeed, for a novel virus. And we did all we could to make our country safe. But then we declared victory much too early, with too much ego and pride, only to have the candle re-light itself. But are the onlookers laughing? Well, Donald Trump is, but that’s another story.

Our poor, our vulnerable, our friends and family who suffer from mental health issues, our small business owners, our domestic violence victims, our post-natal depressed mums stuck in the house with a young baby and screaming kids (because daycare centres are closed), while dad goes to work because they need the money, stuck in a situation where she can’t ask for support due to lockdown restrictions and the safety of the newborn…do you hear their laughter?

It is amazing that there are strongly-held views that the current approach by our government is good for the country. It may be good for certain egos – ‘we did it once, we can do it again’ and we can be back on the global stage wearing our badge of ‘Covid Eliminators’. But at what expense? To kick the poor in their guts again and undo some of the rebuilding of livelihoods that were starting to happen post-round 1?

We knew that it was one family, with the initial 4, now just below a 100. Against a population of 1.5 million in Auckland. For the sake of 100 (or less) we subjugate 1.5 million Aucklanders to restrictions on work, on life, on bouncing back from job losses and unemployment. Why does Dunedin for example, which is so far from Auckland and no one from the original cluster travelled there, have to live life at level 2?

Surely, the Covid Eliminators had the capabilities, as demonstrated in the last few weeks, to effectively contact trace and restrict movements of close contacts of the original cluster, without making the whole country move back into lockdown scenarios.

When we blew out the candle the first time around, we became proud and complacent, me included. We were so eager to cut the cake and be joyous about our celebration that we ignored the re-lighting ability of the candle. It will keep on relighting and like my dear mother, we will eventually run out of breath trying to unsuccessfully blow out the candle. We never reached the ‘new normal’ after round 1.

It’s time to learn to live with the novel virus, for long-term sustainability of our livelihoods, including those which continue to struggle thanks to the reactive lockdowns. We can craft a new ‘new normal’ if we put our egos and pride aside and accept that Covid cannot be eliminated until there is a vaccine.

We have 5 million Kiwis who have the answers…somewhere between the two extremes of wanna-be Covid Eliminators and those who refuse to wear masks, we can find the long-term answers. We can look deep within ourselves, our whanau and our communities to craft a new way forward that involves living safely alongside Covid. Let that be the message to eventually broadcast on the global stage.

Vikashni Moore

August 23 2020

See more:

http://themoorestory.com/index.php/2020/09/12/the-uninvited/

http://themoorestory.com/index.php/2020/08/30/elimination-isolationist/

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