COMMUNITY VOICES
LIFE UNDER LOCKDOWN
NORRIE
IN A NEW REGULAR FEATURE, WE ASK INNER-SYDNEY RESIDENTS TO SHARE THEIR THOUGHTS ON THE BIG ISSUE OF THE DAY. HERE, FIVE PEOPLE TALK ABOUT HOW THEY’VE COPED IN ISO.
JAKE It’s crazy, no good at all — for a lot of people. The self-isolation, it’s not good to be alone. I’m by myself in public housing. Being lonely affects you upstairs. You’ve got to change your routine. I used to go to the library and use the free wifi. Right now, I can’t do that — the library isn’t open yet. Before lockdown, I was going to the soup kitchens and the charities for help. But after COVID hit, finding food became a big headache. I’m on a pension, I don’t have the money. I’ve got to worry about where the next meal is going to come from. After the lockdown, there’s less food available. Restaurants are closed, so there’s less food for the OzHarvest people to recycle. Also, the volunteers are elderly. They don’t want to get COVID, so they stay home. So no-one’s serving at the charities. Right now, things are bad. A lot of people are out of work. People are desperate, they are seeking more assistance. But there’s less available. Before, they use to give you a kilo bag of rice, now it’s a 200gm box of rice. The St. Vinnies food stamp use to be $60, now it’s $30. Does that affect me? Yes, it does, because I didn’t have the money in the first place; now you’re telling me there’s less services available, less food available. If you don’t have mincemeat, if you don’t have the vegetables — what are you going to do? I have to make ends meet somehow. You just eat less if you don’t have the food. Or you become inventive, like putting Milo with rice. It’s an acquired taste.
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I live on my own, so I’m not trapped here with people I don’t want to be with 24/7. On the other hand, how do I socialise when I can’t go for a swim at the pool because it’s closed; I can’t even go to church. And I can’t go to the shops as often. I used to like browsing — that was part of my life. Now you have to know exactly what you’re going to get from the shops while walking down the aisle making sure you don’t bang into anyone else. And you have to make sure you’ve got your credit card ready because cash is dirty. Which means things are a little bit more expensive because often there is a surcharge when you’re paying with a card. It’s tough when you have to fork out a little bit more when the quality of life has been so reduced. So I’m glad we’re getting the next $750 bonus in July — but how do we pay for things between now and then? I’ve got wifi here, it’s medium level. I’ve shared my password with a dozen of my neighbours who are without. All public housing ought to have wifi. A situation like this makes it obvious. Luckily, they’ve kept the television antennas working, so that stops us from rioting.
“At the moment, it is very hard to make any plans, and it’s hard to know what’s going to happen. I really hope that all of this finishes very soon.”
Inner Sydney Voice • Winter 2020 • www.innersydneyvoice.org.au
