Lockdown to ‘locked’ up

Usually getting an exclusive invitation to all inclusive stay is an exciting prospect, but in HK its the one invitation you dread getting. While we were planning our move here, my biggest fear was landing up in Penny‘s Bay, the government quarantine facility. Well last week, my worst fears became a reality.

It started off as a normal day with both girls going to school. There was a ping on my phone indicating I had an email around lunchtime. I had just put V down for a nap and sat down to eat. Probably another spam I thought as I opened it. Nope - it was an email from the school informing us that the parent of one of the children in S’s class, a cargo pilot, had tested positive for Covid and that the entire class would likely be required to undergo a 3 day quarantine at a government facility (despite the actual child in the class testing negative). We were told the class had been isolated and we needed to pick up our children right away. Lunch forgotten, I raced upstairs to wake up a grumpy V who had just fallen asleep. Just the previous day we had received an email saying that all children had to undergo compulsory testing, and I had groaned at the thought of dragging three kids to wait in a line to be swabbed. Now that seemed like a piece of cake. I frantically called hubby knowing he would not have seen the email yet. He left his lunch meeting and took the next ferry home.

Now having done a 21 day quarantine on arrival to HK, I was no stranger to the concept, but I had months to prepare (and I really did start stocking up on toys/activities months ahead). Here, I had no idea when I would get the dreaded call from the Center for Public Health (CHP) or how long they would give me before they carted us off. We had not even decided who would go with S. Having to choose between your children is so difficult and a choice one really shouldn’t have to make. In the end, I chose to go because S felt comfortable with me, and since she would be the one in an unfamiliar environment, we decided she had to be prioritised. The class WhatsApp group had suddenly come alive as parents started discussing what would happen. Despite the fact that Covid had been around for almost two years, it was a first for everyone. Living in our little island bubble, people here had been largely protected. As a class, we decided we would politely decline (as if this was a choice) government quarantine and push for home or even hotel quarantine.

As soon as hubby got home, I raced to the local grocery store to stock up on essentials and ran into S’s teacher and half her class parents doing the same thing. While in the store, the dreaded phone call came. I couldn’t hear that well so i asked them to call my husband. They texted him and what followed was a polite back and forth where hubby tried to push for home quarantine, as did all the other parents. But this was all in vain, by evening we realised that if they issued the order that day, it would count (or so we were told) as Day 1 and pickup likely wouldn’t be till the following day between 9-11 am (we had already put the kids to bed). We caved and provided all the details confirming the order would be issued that day. The order issued on November 10th stayed we would remain in quarantine until Nov 12th (midnight we were verbally told).

The next morning we woke up expecting a call that the bus would arrive. At 9:30 we got a call informing us that pickup would be between 12-3. We had read that no one would help with luggage so to pack well, but only what we could carry. At 3 the bus arrived and Sahana and I waved an apprehensive goodbye to hubby, L and V. We picked up 3 other families, two of whom were in S’s class and a short drive later we pulled in PB. Oddly enough, its located behind the happiest place on earth - Disney. There were rows and rows of these purpose built prisons essentially in different bright colors. It felt very surreal to think this would be our home for (hopefully only) the next few days.

We waited on the bus for about 40 minutes before they let us off the bus, signed us in, handed us a ‘welcome’ package and showed us to our exclusive suite in the green wing. The children, obvious (thankfully) to the reality were picking the colors they wanted to stay in.

Now up until this point , S was quite excited at the prospect of having mummy all to herself in a ‘hotel’ (she was definitely picturing interconnected room like our hotel quarantine). As soon as we walked into the room, the bubble burst. “Mummy this is so small“ she said.The beds were encased in plastic - we stripped everything off, I wiped everything down with antibacterial wipes and put our own sheets and blankets on.

Now was the room that bad? No, the room itself was tiny, but functional and relatively clean akin to a 2-3 star hotel. But the food was something else entirely - during our 3 day stay S and I lived off cup o noodles and jam sandwiches ( S didn’t mind so much since she’s quite fond of them) and a lot of junk food.

After settling in, the whole class started calling the hotline to try to get us tested as we did not want that to delay our exit from the ‘resort’. In vain, as they did not test us until the following day. Unlike the hotel quarantine, we were at least able to open windows (and the doors were not locked) though you were not allowed to leave the room) and S spent a lot of time chatting and calling out to her fellow inmates. Children amaze me at how resilient they are - S kept herself occupied with Lego, books, drawing, Kumon (not by choice) and of course ample amout of TV and Ipad time.

S’s school was brilliant and they sent all the children a care package as well as arranged transport to pick up everyone when released.

That night after S had fallen asleep, I heard a shriek from outside. I looked outside the window and saw fire! The mom and daughter from our bus, two doors down, had a blanket catch on fire - about 4 staff came running, but did not do anything. Thankfully the mother had the presence of mind to run back in, grab a bottle of water and throw it on the fire, putting it out. Needless to say there were no fire extinguishers in the room. The poor girl was terribly traumatised and both were taken by ambulance to the hospital to be treated for minir burns. I sincerely hope they were allowed to go home after.

The next day, our supposed release date we all received another nasty surprise - a text from the Health Dept saying our quarantine would be extended a day. We were livid, and we all once again bombarded the hotline to get a answer. Unfortunately, despite our best efforts, we were not able to get a justification for the extension (although in retrospect they were counting from the day we entered) and following the advice of one of the parents a lawyer, decided to stay put given the grey lines of whether a text message trumps the original quarantine order. By this time, we were more than ready to leave and the whole day we had seen even more people from DB arriving on buses - in total the CHP brought in over 400 people over 1 case.

The next morning (our new release date) we thankfully received negative test results for all the children (surprise surprise). Yet, none of the parents had received their results. At around noon, one of S’s classmates randomly got a call saying she was being released. A few hours later I received the call (very welcome call this time) saying as long as I could get my own transport and provide the license number, we could leave or we could wait for the 6 pm bus. Guess which option I chose? As soon I called a cab, I called back to provide the details and of course I had a diff person on the line who had no idea what I was calling about. After 45 of calling every hotline and texting every available WhatsApp number, i finally got a knock on the door to be escorted out.

S and me on our way home.

So nice to be reunited with hubby L and V! As it turned out daddy did great - I should go away more often, but let’s hope never to PB again!