I'm not just sure, I'm Covid positive

 I got tested positive for covid on the 29th December 2021. I almost made it to the end of the year...

This was a huge surprise to me because while traveling around Ireland and the UK I took a total of 2 PCR tests, 2 official antigen tests, and 4 lateral flow self-tests. All negative. While I almost certainly picked up the virus in London (read my previous post about England's approach to Covid), I only developed really noticeable symptoms on the evening I arrived back in the Netherlands on the 26th. This is my story:

The symptoms on the 26th were quite mild in the evening. I had a slightly sore throat and a slightly runny nose. 

On the 27th I still had mild symptoms, but my throat was beginning to hurt more. When going to bed I felt unusually cold for about 15 minutes despite wearing multiple layers and cuddling my portable hot water bottle (Winry). 

On the 28th all symptoms remained mild except for my throat. It was really starting to hurt now. When going to bed I could feel my windpipe swelling up, making it uncomfortable to breathe. 

I tried to sleep it off but at 3am, on the morning of the 29th, I woke up finding it much harder to breathe. My throat was very narrow and mucus was blocking the rest. I tried to swallow a small cold & coughing tablet which should have reduced the mucus that was obstructing my windpipe. Predictably, the tiny pill got stuck in my throat. Whoops. Despite this, I could still breathe fine - albeit uncomfortably. However, worried at the rate my throat was closing up, I thought it would be a mistake to wait another 5 hours to visit my GP. I woke Kaz up and told her to drive me to the hospital. The wait at the emergency entrance was long and arduous. While talking in a high-pitched voice, I had to tell the receptionist everything: symptoms, address, BSN, health insurance numbers, ID etc. She eventually let me through with a warning: "next time make an appointment to go to the emergency, the doctor is very annoyed with you".  The doctor managed to solve my throat issue by feeding me a crushed-up ibuprofen pill with water. No dramatic emergency throat slicing needed. He told me my symptoms were consistent with that of Omicron and that self-tests are very insensitive to the new variant. Kaz and I both did a PCR test that morning and we both did self-tests. We both tested negative on the self-tests and Kaz got a negative for the PCR test. My PCR test wouldn't come back positive until the late afternoon of the 30th. 

England 2021

Ireland done. next stop, England. 

Day 1: 

We arrived at Heathrow airport and were greeted with a clusterfuck of bureaucracy. Firstly, the 2 PCR tests we had booked (in Ireland and in London) weren't checked. Neither was our passenger locator form. Secondly, after waiting for 2 hours for our bags to arrive, we finally found them on separate baggage carousels! Then, lastly, we had to catch a black cab to the COVID testing site because we were running late. The clinic had highly untrained personnel (my swab barely touched my nose). The taxi driver, who was not wearing a mask, vented to us about how COVID kills fewer people than the flu and that it's destroying the economy. He was extremely critical of card payments and was very open about how much he wanted the PM to die. Admittedly, the cab driver was homeless - he showed us the sleeping bag and gas heater in the back seat before he drove off in a huff. 

With our bad start out of the way, we were ready to start our day. The first thing we noticed was how similar everything looked to Australia. The brick front yards were a dead giveaway. 

When we arrived at Pestana hotel, Kaz was very eager to jump straight into self-isolation without saying hi to my auntie. Unfortunately, this didn't work out because Alex and Clare were there ready to ambush us on our arrival. After our not-so 1.5m hello's we sprinted upstairs and spent the remainder of the day and the following day in isolation. 

Day 2:

Self-isolation sucks, but if you have to endure it, it helps to have a great hotel room. The room, which was partially purchased by my parents and my uncle, was pretty swish. It had a decent view of Battersea Park and had a bathtub with neon lights. 

It struck me as odd that we needed to self isolate ourselves so effectively in London. I could understand self-isolating in New Zealand because you can view the country as a pure, clean Petri dish. But England is more like a messy dog bowl. If anything, the whole country should isolate to protect us.

In the evening, after enough kicking and screaming, Karen allowed me to have dinner with my Aunt and Uncle. Marcus was there too. Clare made an excellent dinner and it was nice catching up with my family. Marcus is a stereotypical British University student. He says "you know what I mean, right?" in every sentence and talks endlessly about his drinking escapades. 

Day 3:

This was our busiest day. We took the Uber boat all the way to London Bridge and walked around. The whole country was completely open. Stores were wide open, people were running, pubs were crowded. It was a big change from the Netherlands. We saw the Tate museum and to my surprise I actually really liked it. I ended up focusing almost none of my attention on the post-modern "artworks" and spent a lot of time admiring a mechanical project. Someone had created giant floating octopuses that were floating in midair with the help of drone propellers. It was very captivating and I couldn't help but figure out how they worked. 

In the evening Daniel Chee and I met up on Mayfair. All 3 of us enjoyed a very British meal consisting of Raman noodles and octopus balls. After that, we walked through the light festival and proceeded to get drunk in a local bar. It was great catching up with Daniel. 

Even in my drunken stooper I couldn't help but notice how much the average Brit doesn't care about COVID. No one wears masks and no one obeys government regulation. It's as if the whole society has become numb to the pandemic after the first hard lockdown.

Day 4:

We spent the largest part of our day recovering from our hangover. I walked a lot around Battersea Park while Kaz capitalized on our amazing hotel quality and read manga on her phone. 

In the evening we went to Wimbledon to meet up with my cousin, Andrew, and his wife Hellen. I really enjoyed meeting up with them. They have a kid called Marius and he's an uncontrollable bundle of energy that's strangely quite shy. I had never had a long conversation with Hellen before (only some quick small talk in Ireland for their wedding 4 years ago). It was very refreshing having a serious, intelligent conversation with them. Andrew was still very vague about his job, but I did find out that he spends at least part of his time contracted out to fight cybercrime against insurance companies. Hellen has an extremely stressful job doing psychology work on attempted suicide victims. To top off the night we went to the pub and drank some hot chocolates and ate some crisps. 

Day 5:

Christmas! Jake and Laura rocked up to Clare and Mark's apartment and we all had a very enjoyable Christmas together. They have a baby called Casper. The conversation was light-hearted and friendly. To top it off we played a board game called Codenames - adult-themed. It was a lot of fun. 

Day 6:
Last day. We met up with Daniel again briefly for another pub feed then sprinted our way around town to get more covid tests + a 2 hour bus to Stansted airport. 

Goodbye England! This was definitely more of a family visit than a country tour, and it was much needed! Stay posh.

Ireland 2021

 Kaz and I planned a trip to Ireland and England over Christmas. The itinerary is:

1. Eindhoven --> Dublin (flight)
2. Dublin --> Donegal (bus)
3. Donegal --> Dublin (bus)
4. Dublin --> London (swim)
5. London --> Eindhoven (flight)

Originally we had planned to rent a car from Dublin to Donegal. This would have been convenient because it would have allowed us to travel up North where we could access a lot of remote hikes, and also see some of Karen's ancestry. Ultimately, however, we went with the bus option because all rental cars require a credit card: something neither of us has. The bus option turned out to be extremely ideal, not just because it was cheaper and dropped us off exactly by our hotel, but because the small, windy, dimly lit Irish roads would have been very stressful to drive through for 3 hours. This bus ride was a small taste of things to come...

Donegal is extremely rural. The whole town is really sandwiched on the outskirts of a large roundabout. There are 2 supermarkets, 2 hotels, 1 school, 1 castle, and 34 bars. 

Day 1 - Donegal

Unsurprisingly, we spent a lot of the first day jumping into and out of bars drinking Guinness & eating hearty pub food. The food was fantastic; a very welcome change from Dutch bread and cheese. In addition to this, we also toured the abbey. The abbey was nothing more than a pile of overgrown rocks in a graveyard. At one point it was intended to store gunpowder to fight off the British before it exploded. We also saw a graveyard commemorated to all the Irish that died in the famine in the mid-1800's. 

Day 2 - Donegal

This day was a lot less morbid. We took 2 busses to Slieve League - a wonderful hiking region on the west coast. The hike was fantastic. The weather was perfect and it was completely empty as well. I might tactically organize more hikes in Winter. Because the town was so empty, we really got to have long personal conversations with our bus drivers. Fortunately, we had been in Ireland for ~ 24 hours at this point so the Irish were somewhat understandable to us. The bus drivers spoke fluent Gaelic and were very passionate about preserving the language the culture. To finish the day, we had a spa in our hotel and went to a pub for another Irish dinner. 

Overall, I had a really good impression of Donegal. There was a very peaceful vibe and the people are extremely friendly and great talkers. The customer service is outstandingly good (at least compared to the Dutch). The only downside is that the town is so small that there really isn't much to do except drink.

Day 3 - Dublin

After another 3 hour bus ride we arrived in Dublin. Within the first 10 minutes I was greeted by a giant Guinness truck zooming past, and the stench of weed in the air from some teenagers smoking in broad daylight. Later on, I walked around the city and noticed thousands of people crammed shoulder to shoulder attempting to do last-minute Christmas shopping. Everyone was quite vigilant about wearing their mask and using hand sanitizer but seemed completely sanguine about crawling over each other to buy some jewelry or a board game. Despite this, it was nice to see such liveliness. There's a very young, artsy vibe in Dublin which can be seen everywhere. 

Day 4 - Dublin

We walked to the Kilmainham Gaol (pronounced "jail" (and also means "jail")). While walking there, we passed a bunch of crack heads. These were a group of people (probably homeless) that were openly smoking crack cocaine at 8am in broad daylight in the middle of Dublin. It was creepy to see how low a human life can go. Once we arrived at the Gaol we were lucky enough to squeeze into a tour. The tour guide was excellent. He walked through a lot of things but there were a few main takeaways: 1) The jail flip-flopped from Irish to British control several times, 2) It housed the main leaders from the IRA that staged the 1916 revolt against the British. They all got executed in the end. And 3) During the famine in the mid 1800's, the gaol became flooded (x12 capacity) with people. This was partially because the jail had the obligation to feed its prisoners, and people who were on the verge of starvation would deliberately commit crimes to get fed. Kaz was fed up from walking after the tour so we took an overcrowded tram back to the city center to rest up at our hotel. In the evening we went out for pub food again and made friends with some Irish women in their 50's. They were extremely nice but very critical of Americans. Kaz resisted the urge to correct them. 

Day 5 - Dublin

We went to Trinity College. Kaz went to the book of kells museum. I want to the archeology museum. No regrets. The museum was great. There was detailed evidence about Irish history. You got to see how Irish culture and art changed as they were influenced by the Romans in the period between 100AD - 400AD, the Vikings in the 800's - 1000's, and the British in the 1300's onwards. I found myself most interested in Viking history in Ireland. Over 200 years, the Vikings had slowly merged with the Irish despite frequent battles. The Irish started using coins thanks to the Vikings and changed their art and language. I liked this history because it begs important philosophical questions. Obviously, from the perspective of the Irish that were first invaded by the Vikings, our moral intuitions are tuned to think this is an unspeakable moral tragedy. But when you zoom out to the perspective of centuries (rather than months or years) things become much more gray. Was Ireland better off being enriched by the culture and technology of its invaders in the long term? What is the best definition of Irish culture on this time scale and is it something worth preserving?

Overall I liked Dublin a lot. It's messy, chaotic, lively, and friendly. I don't think I could live in Dublin, but I could certainly visit again. 

Poland trip days 1-5

Following an easing of covid restrictions I made plans to travel to Poland and Spain for a 2 week holiday. 

Poland day 1:

Now that I've officially learned 7 Dutch words, I decided to live up to my newfound heritage by bike riding to the airport. My flight departed at 5:45 p.m. and I arrived in Krakow in the late evening. My German friend, Basti, who lives very close to Poland in the East part of Germany, arrived shortly after me from a 15 hour bus ride. We immediately noticed a outdoor festival and purchased some good Spanish food and wine. Since it was already pretty late we decided to go to a 24-hour grocery store and go to our shitty hostel to stay the night. 

Poland day 2:

All prior attempts to book a direct bus to the tatras mountain range had failed due to errors on their website. So we decided to ambush the bus driver at one of the stops and see if we could hop on. Once successful we were on our way for a 2-hour drive. The hike was outstanding. It was mostly uphill and we got a great view of two lakes by the famous hut Morskie Oko. While hiking uphill we saw lots of polish people coming up and down the mountain. I noticed that most of the polish men are extremely fat and ugly whereas most of the polish woman are incredibly thin and coated with makeup. It was also interesting to see how much gender stereotypes affect polish couples. The women would often seek to be guided and supported by their male partners and walk extremely cautiously and slowly. I wonder if this has something to do with Poland's strong orthodox Christian roots. After a few mishaps (including me almost losing my one water bottle at the peak of the mountain) we successfully arrived at our hut. My friend and I enjoyed a large beer and a traditional polish dinner and then went to sleep shortly afterwards.

Poland day 3:

This day was by far the hardest. Rain had pounded the mountain all night and had no intention of stopping throughout the day. Within only a few hours my "waterproof" jacket had absorbed a small swimming pools worth of rainwater which had fully soaked all of my clothes and food. This was also the longest hike we were planning to do: about 20km. There were lots of ups and downs, slippery rocks, and overgrown paths. Regardless we persevered and made our way to the second hut in about 12 hours. We were so physically exhausted and mentally drained from talking to each other for several hours that we decided to veg out and play computer games on our phones for an hour or so.

Poland day 4:

The rain was still going strong today but that made no difference to us because our clothes were already soaked in water. Fortunately the hike was only 9 km long and mostly downhill. We arrived in Zakopane and immediately paid for a taxi to drop us off at our hotel. The first thing we did on arrival is dropp down our water soaked bags and make our way to the nearest thermal pool spa facility. We spent almost 4 hours there just sitting in the nice warm traditional polish sauna. 

Poland day 5:

This was our last full day in Poland and we spent most of it in the restaurant of our hotel enjoying the benefits of a free buffet breakfast. Once our carb levels had returned to their pre-hike equilibrium we tried to take public transport back to Krakow. This proved way harder than expected because the bus services in Poland are horrible. We missed the first bus because a guy in front of us asked the bus driver if it went to some obscure destination. On discovery that it didn't he left in a huff. The bus driver assumed we were with the other guy and drove off. We missed the second bus for a similar reason. On the third attempt we bulldozed our way in, shouldering our way in front of elderly person in queue. Once back in Krakow, we toured the city center one final time. I'd had enough goulash to last a lifetime, so we settled on some greasy burgers to finish our journey

Luxembourg trip

Day 1: 6th April

Kaz and I set off to Luxembourg for a much needed holiday. Luxembourg was the country of choice purely because of it's stance on Covid; it didn't have one. However, to drive to Luxembourg we needed to go through Germany or Belgium. If Luxembourg can be personified as a hippy preaching for free entry everywhere, Belgium and Germany can be viewed as bouncers to a fancy nightclub. Just to be on the safe side, I did my research, filled out the forms, and got tested for Covid. All of it turned out to be unnecessary in the end because there was no border patrol whatsoever. What was even more surprising is that there were hundreds of cars every second zipping across the border. It was pretty disheartening to see all of the isolation efforts by my friends be made almost completely redundant within a second. 

Three hours and one parking ticket later we were in Luxembourg. Even though the whole country is tiny, and even though there is a national language (it's called Luxembourgish, and yeah, I thought it sounded made up too), the dialect is noticeably different from region to region. As you get closer to the west it sounds more French, and as you get closer to the east it sounds more German. The houses are also very strange. Unlike the Netherlands, which consists of row after row of identical looking houses, Luxembourg has brightly colored houses popping out of the ground in all types of weird places and orientations. It looks like a child got frustrated placing in those rectangular leggo pieces and resorted to hammering them in instead. 

We arrived at our remotely located hotel and immediately decided to do a hike. It was only a 2 hour hike, but still very rewarding. 

Day 2: 7th April

We woke up at 7am to have breakfast and start our hike for the day. We ended up hiking to Echternach via some of the famous caves. It was lovely. Once we arrived, it started to snow down heavily so we decided to take cover in a restaurant by a lake. Luckily, today was the first day that restaurants and cafes were allowed to open. Unluckily, Covid restrictions still forced us to sit in the outdoor area. After the cold snap, Kaz and I decided to pack it in early and take a bus back to our hotel. We enjoyed a lovely hot tub, some Chinese food and got to bed early. 

Day 3: 8th April

We had a very lazy start to the day. We woke up late, enjoyed our free breakfast and drove to a castle in Bedorf. The castle was just like any other except for the torture area. There was a whole assortment of pully systems, cranks and spikes all used in creative ways to crush fingers, dislocate shoulders and severe tendons. It's crazy to think how unempathetic these people were. After the sobering visit to the castle, Kaz and I took a walk around the park, disconnected from reality for a while by catching pokemon, and checked into our new accommodation - a place in a prime location for additional hikes. We had a long conversation with the owner of the hotel who said that the hotel had been pretty much unused for the last 2 years. In 2018 they had a flood, and right after they did the renovations Covid hit in full force. The owner tried to hide her bitterness that the Luxembourg Government hadn't given her any support money due to the pandemic. 

In the evening Megan and Yesh, 2 of our South African friends finally arrived and we settled in for some more Chinese and drinking.

Day 4: 9th April

This was our big hiking day! We walked a full 20km around mostly Mullerthal trail 2. It was stunning. We passed the famous caves which got super narrow and pitch black. A very rewarding treat. After that we ordered in some Italian food, played Settlers of Catan and drank some more alcohol.

Day 5: 10th April

My birthday was delightful. My parents went through the effort of ordering Champaign and a snack platter for Kaz, Megan, Yesh and I. Kaz gave me a Strava subscription for a year along with some NASA fanboy gear. Megan & Yesh gave me a triathlon belt. The weather was not so rewarding so we decided not to hike today and tour Luxembourg city. However, due to a rapid series of fuckups, we ended up driving there in double the time of public transport (which is free, by the way), and with a speeding fine. Regardless the city was beautiful. There were lots of old forts and castles scattered throughout the center due to its history of being a punching bag between France and Spain.