The Journey of 53 days

COVID-19 and quarantine is the 2 things that all of us dread the idea of having to go through. I am lucky to not contract covid19 but at the same time unfortunate enough to endure the quarantine period 14 days upon arriving in Sarawak, in accordance to the state's SOP.

In actual fact, I had been pushing forward the trip to East Malaysia from October last year with hopes the Sarawak government will overturn the ruling of their compulsory quarantine of 14 days. To my despair, that was not the case, and the constant pressing from the client's end wanting me to be physically present here in Sarawak to complete the training session amongst all hierarchy of their staffs( a State government Agency).

As usual, despite clearing two PCR - covid test, one was rejected as I had surpassed the 3 days results requirement before arrival.

Had to perform another COVID test at the 11th hour by pushing Pathlab to give me the results within a day. And to no surprise, Yes! I got it.

Upon reaching Kuching airport , we were treated as if we were Covid patient. It took almost 4 hours complete the swab test within the airport , fill forms of various clearance , declaration and immigration.

My flight from KL was at 11am and arrival in Kuching was at 1pm. With an empty stomach combined with all this strenuous procedures, All I could think to myself was "Oh god! I want to leave and head back home!“.

Anyhow there is no turning back now, adding to the equation, my commitment to work strived me along through all the above.

I boarded the designated quarantine bus for travelers (to channel us to hotel to begin the quarantine process) at about 4.30pm. I could not control my hunger and ended up frantically looking for something or anything to munch on even. But to my luck, the ONLY kiosk open within the Kuching airport was Famous Amos cookies. Having no choice, I bought 100g biscuits for RM13.00 together with a drink for RM 2.

Finally, We reached hotel at around 5.30pm . And once again another procedural briefing on the terms & conditions of quarantine within the hotel vicinity.

In simpler words, you are not allowed to step out of your designated room and not a soul will clean your room. Food will be served 3 times a day at a stipulated period.

Room service will delivery the food at 7am for breakfast by knocking on your door twice. This process is repeated with lunch at 11.00am followed by dinner at 5pm. Now, if you go hungry between these duration, you are allowed to order from restaurants nearby but the delivery to your room is only twice a day which is fixed at 11am and 5pm. If you miss that 2 slots, then anything you had ordered, be it a Briyani or a Pizza, you will only receive it the very next day.

Don't even get me started on the quality of the food served during the quarantine period. To overcome this, I bought some Maggi cup and canned food from Food Panda.

The canned food - how do I cook the can food in the 5 star hotel that is now a quarantine center?

I start by boiling the water and placing the canned food inside the kettle . Once its ready, I mix with the rice provided by hotel. That’s the food for almost all of 14 days in this quarantine.

On the 10th day of quarantine we were told to come down to the lobby for our final swab test. After 10 days of being confined within the room, I felt so relief to come in contact with other humans, but that only lasted for 10 minutes.

After the swab test, I was escorted back to room.

To kill my boredom, I practically watched almost all the serials on Netflix and Prime. "Luxury Prison" that was my tag line for this quarantine whenever I was on a video call with family.

After 14 days of enduring all this, I was finally a free man. As for the balance 39days, all i had in mind was to ensure I complete all the training in Big Data for my customers.

This is the first time I had been away from my family for more than 2 weeks..

The thing I realized about the 5 star hotel I resided during my quarantine, was that it had brought me no happiness even after leaving the same way it does having to be at home with my family.

Home is always ranked as 6 star in my books. Say NO to Covid and NO to quarantine.

Stay safe - Magindren Kuppusamy