This archive report was first published on 21 April 2020.
As I lay in my poorly ventilated room, I couldn't help but wonder: 'Just who ate that bat in China?' I was paying for someone's mistake, and my sleep pattern had been disrupted.
It was on the third day in quarantine that I met a young woman who had a rosary, her only source of inspiration in the circumstances. We began talking, and she told me she had interacted with a pastor the previous day, and that they had agreed to plan for prayer meetings that evening. I nodded, yes.
When we finally met for the prayers, I realised that the pastor had not come. Instead, we met a grey-haired, slim man in his late 50s, who had arrived from Malawi. I later found out that there were many people from Malawi at this camp, and I wondered silently why.
Our meetings went on for a few days, but we never did any Bible study. We just opened up on our fears, and it became an hour for venting. We would narrate our fears regarding our predicament.
One of my friends had some construction work in Thogoto that had been interrupted by the crisis. Venting helped. We became less moody and more even tempered, although unsure of what lay ahead.
Every morning, after breakfast, we looked forward to our scheduled meetings. This helped for a while. Beatrice, a woman from Karen, confessed that she had never read the Bible. And this despite having grown up in Thogoto, a stronghold of Christianity in Kenya. We all laughed at that, although there were few jokes.
Something else happened. I lost track of time and could not tell what day or time of the week it was. There was no TV, no newspaper, no radio. Social media was our only connection with the healthy world. We, the risk sapiens, had to rely entirely on hearsay… and daily updates from the ministry of Health via Twitter or Facebook.
On the eighth day, medics in white protective gear arrived. The scamp went silent. Everyone seemed uncomfortable, recollecting whether they had been careful enough, whether they had experienced any sore throat, however mild; and whether any of their close contacts had coughed or sneezed in their presence in the past week.
It was time for the mandatory Covid-19 test. And unlike during temperature checks and meal times, no one wanted to go first. There was no counselling on what to expect. We had no idea what it entailed, which I found unprofessional and unethical.
That evening, only YouTube gospel music could be heard from the cell phones. Mine was, perhaps, the loudest. Music of hope. Encouragement. Pleading with God for 'good' results. But there was nothing I could do. The sample had been taken.
