by Sarah Kulla, Queretaro

“Hey, take good care…don’t greet anybody by giving that peck on the cheek that is so in here, and try not to shake anybody’s hand either. Keep your distance. If you feel sick, immediately call a doctor or have someone take you to a Centro de Salud, whichever one, it doesn’t matter, as long as it belongs to the Government, as they are the ones who are controlling the meds right now as far as I know…”  -Advice from my boss

I don’t remember where I was when I first heard talk of the swine flu epidemic, which is strange, because it has really changed my plans for these next two weeks. I am in my house now, and I will be until an order is issued by the government to reopen the schools, businesses, museums, theatres, whorehouses and libraries in my colonial city of Queretaro, Mexico.  Right now, the date to resume public activity is set for May 6^th. I won’t lie to you though; I am by no means in the eye of the hurricane. The real action is happening right now in Mexico City, about four hours away from here by bus.

Or wait, isn’t the “eye” of the hurricane the calm place in the middle of turmoil? It is pretty calm where I am. I just went for a short jog this morning, in a park near my house I like to refer to as Parque Robachicos (or Kidnapper Park in English). There were fewer people on the street, but not all of them were wearing the face masks recommended to prevent you from touching your nose and mouth and thus contracting the swine flu virus. Maybe they couldn’t find the masks because all of the pharmacies are sold out. I got my mask for free at the grocery store, where a clerk who was supposed to hand them out to employees only kindly broke the rules.

I have been reading the news a lot, because I don’t have anything else to do. I went to the grocery store yesterday to buy a lot of food like papaya, pineapple, chicken soup ingredients, etc. You can imagine how, in a way, it is kind of nice to have no option but to chill out for a week. Everything is on hold, and the sentiment is mixed: one part schoolchildren’s “snow-day” felicity, one part apocalyptic apprehension.

Of course, this will really hurt the Mexican economy, which was in pretty damned bad shape already. Even before the appearance of Influenza Porcina (swine flu) the capital city was facing a horrible economic crisis. Restaurants, desperate for business, put up signs in the window begging for customers: “Eat and pay whatever you want,” they pleaded. That’s pretty extreme.

Now, with each day that passes in suspended labor, Mexico City is reported to lose a mind blowing sum of money, some 500 million pesos a day, or 50 million US dollars. I suppose the government is planning to accept a bunch of loans from other countries to deal with that. On top of it, a mid-sized earthquake, 5.6 on the Richter scale, shook the enormous megalopolis, causing huge freak outs everywhere.

Mexico is not the only country affected by the Swine flu, which has led to fear of Pandemic, as you may have read or heard on the news. Cases have been reported in the US (64 total as of today), Spain, and New Zealand as well. The earth has too many people, and concentrated mass production of livestock inevitably leads to problems. The virus itself is like nothing we have seen. It combines genetic material (DNA) from birds, humans, and pigs into one crazy, rapidly multiplying, and sometimes deadly organism.

How deadly, you ask? Not very! The death rates at this point are very low. I think something like 1 out of every 200 people infected has died. As always, the people who died so far likely did not receive much medical attention, because the world was not yet aware of the problem. It is in the best interest of every nation on earth, especially North American and European countries, to rapidly seek vaccines and cures for the Swine Flu, and everyone knows it. Residents of this lovely Mexican nation are all taking precautions, disinfecting their hands, reading the news, etc. It won’t be long, I imagine, before we have this thing wrapped up, like we did with SARS and the Avian Flu before this.

Then, we can continue humanity’s quest to massively overpopulate and deplete the resources of the Earth. In the mean time, I say we ought to focus on the beautiful things that still surround us… it’s a sunny day down here. Children are playing in the street outside my window. Fragrance of guava fills the room.