Don’t expect an outbreak of manners
If you didn’t bake your own sourdough bread while you were in level 4 lockdown, were you really in lockdown? My social media feed was filled with images of people’s splendid bread making and baking efforts and it was jolly inspirational. So much so that by the last week, I had attempted my own roti bread (A fail. Not thin enough; not hot enough, apparently. Isn’t that just the story of my life?).
I also made my own chocolate-dipped coconut macaroons — which I must never make again because I can’t even begin to imagine the calorific content of those moreish little morsels. A can of condensed milk, for heaven’s sake! I haven’t had condensed milk since I was a child.
There was something very pleasurable about having the time to produce food for your bubble and certainly, if you had children in your bubble, it was a great activity to perform together, ticking all the home schooling boxes . . . maths, chemistry, art, home science . . .
Those magnificent women, Nadia Lim and Chelsea Winter, present-day holders of the Kitchen Queen Wooden Spoons once held by the likes of Alison Holst and Hudson and Halls, have been indefatigable throughout the lockdown, urging us all to connect with our food and appreciate the simple joy that comes from creating a meal from raw ingredients.
Their exhortations have obviously fallen on a few deaf ears however, if the queues of cars outside fast-food joints around the country on Tuesday morning were anything to go by.
Some Kiwis have been counting the days till we moved from level 4 to level 3 and were ready to celebrate with takeaways and to rise at dawn to get their first fix of McDonald’s in a month.
It was quite extraordinary looking at the lines and lines of cars, but then I can’t be too judgy. McDonald’s and KFC isn’t my thing, but I’m fortunate that the food and drink I enjoy has been available all the way through lockdown.
It seems extraordinary that alcohol was considered essential; yet it was and who am I to argue with the authorities? I can imagine that had I been denied my fix, as the Maccas devotees were, I would have been outside the bottle shop as soon as the doors opened looking for a lovely bottle of Martinborough pinot.
I hope I wouldn’t have been as rude to the staff had they run out of what I was after as some of the fast-food fans were. I suppose after hearing the stories of violent assault and racist abuse on Countdown staff, I shouldn’t be surprised that fast-food workers received a barrage of abuse when they ran out of some products or ran out of time to serve everybody who’d been queuing this week. But I was.
Assaults on Countdown staff were up 600 per cent during level 4. It’s outrageous. And North Shore KFC staff were abused and yelled at when they shut their doors at the designated closing time
HWhat’s your view? letters@hos.co.nz on Tuesday. Madness.
As one of the staffers said, nobody’s forcing you to sit in a queue for three hours. Your choice to do it. And the KFC will be there the next day. Just like the toilet rolls. There’s no need to panic and there’s never any call to beat up — literally or metaphorically — people who are doing their not-terribly-well-paid jobs.
Optimists throughout this lockdown have hoped that coming out of the pandemic, we’ll have learned a few lessons along the way . . . that we’ll enjoy a gentler, more meaningful existence as a result of slowing down and connecting with what really matters.
Looking at the queues outside the drive throughs, it looks like we’re heading straight back to the lives we left behind.
● Kerre McIvor Mornings, Newstalk ZB, weekdays 9am-noon