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The first lockdown was announced on 24 March 2020. We had to stay at home, and only go out for getting essentials (such as food and medical supplies) and exercise, by ourselves. (Various people still had to go out to work, of course, such as health workers, care workers, delivery people.)
This meant that the streets were empty. It was very creepy. These photos are of Burleigh Street and Fitzroy Street in Cambridge, taken at lunchtime on Wednesday 25 March.
By mid-May, regulations were relaxed in various ways. One was "meeting a friend at the park" (socially distanced, of course) which made a great difference! While coming back from such a walk, I noticed that various shops in Burleigh Street and FItzroy Street in Cambridge had various notices in their windows explaining that they were closed. These had obviouslky been up since the start of lockdown, but I hadn't noticed them before (because my "essential trips" had not taken me past there). I found the notices charming, so photographed them. Sorry for the long explanation - I wanted to point out that I was not taking photos during strict lockdown, which would have been against the rules. We did try to follow the rules!
Reading these again, I note the "Stay safe" comments, which appeared during the pandemic. People would use it as a sign-off in emails. There is also variants between saying closure was for people's safety, and bluntly saying that it was due to government regulations. Some shops still had their "when we're open after Chrsitmas" notice next to "we're closed!". One had a long list describing sanitising, next to the "actually you can't come it anyway". And I do like "Coronavirus (Corvid-10)"!
Masks and hand sanitisers became part of our lives. The first mask I wore was to give blood, where face covering was compulsory, but it didn't have to be a proper mask. I used a strip of cloth cut from a bed sheet. My fiend sported a natty number with bikes on it (we live in Cambridge, after all). I must point out that the head gear and the dark glasses were because it was hot! And we didn't care what we look like. But we were careful to cover mouth and nose, as required.
On 15 Jun 2020, non-essential shops re-opened, but under regulations. They had to maintain social distancing. They required you to use hand sanitiser as well (although I think that it was increasingly believed that this was an air-borne disease, not contact.) And there were other matters, such as masks, and not coming in if you had symptoms of Covid. Social distancing was the big thing. Each shop worked out how many people could come in and still stay the required distance apart. Big shops would have a guard on the door, to make sure that the number in the shop was OK> If full, you could only enter if another left. Small shops told you what the limit was, and you were asked to obey it yourself. To make things even more complicated, the social distancing was sometimes 2 metres, and sometimes 1 metre. I'm not sure if this was at different times, or different types of shop.
Some people were genuinely frightened to go shopping again, so some shops wanted to reassure them about the precautions, about frequent cleaning, or screens in front of the staff at the cash desk. Supermarkets had screens between self-checkout counters (although people tended to try and not use one next to someone else, even so). Charity shops closed their changing rooms. Contactless payments was recommended. Some outlets refused to accept money. (Some would only accept money!)
One perhaps unexpected consequence of lockdown was that people, being bored, cleared out their houses, which meant large amounts of things to go to charity shops. Some accepted items during lockdown, but some were completely empty throughout lockdown. And the volunteers in charity shops are often elderly, so would be in the vulnerable category.
All this meant more notices....
And then the queues! Oh, the queues! There was a certain amount of panic buying of food (and bog roll) at the start, but I don't remember queues then, just stuff running out. Non-essential shops were closed from 23 March to 15 June 2020, and that included clothes, so when they reopened, there was a rush to buy things, especially children's clothes. (Children grow, you know...) But that only caused queues for a day or so. The real queues happened because of social distancing. Only small numbers were allowed inside shops at any one time (see above for the numbers diaplayed). Any more than that, you had to wait until someone came out before you could go in, and that meant a queue.
Someone figured out that the queue outside needed to be socially distanced as well, so there were marks or strips on the pavement to spread us out. There were also "Keep left" signs for broad pavements (which I think were the most ignored signs). And of course loads of general "social distancing" signs everwhere. Some of them are still there (2024)! I like male/female version. We called it "No snogging". Well, after Hancock's kiss (June 2021), perhaps it was necessary!
There also arrangements within shops. I haven't taken any photos within shops, as I felt it was my duty to do my shopping as quickly as possible, and get out of the shop, not hang around taking photos. But here's a description. If there were two doors, one was top enter, and one to exit. If there was one door, either they tried dividing the entrance into two, or they divided in and out as quickly as possible. At the door, there was sanitiser (and they tended to work in different ways). Then there was often a one-way system within shops. Charity shops closed their changing rooms. At the cash desk, there would be more queue arrangements, with places to wait to socially distance us. The staff might have a screen in front, to protest us and them. And everyone wore masks. In the shop, that was, most people took them off once out, or pulled them down, or daintily hung over one ear (my preference). That was OK - masks were only within shops (and I'm not sure when that came in - offialdom changed their minds on masks.)
So it was weird, and rather a hassle. But, oh!, we were desperate to shop! We needed clothes, or other things (bike tyre in my case, and turps for an artist friend of mine!) But how lovely just to wander round a shop, seeing what there was! The charity shops were buzzing!
Official advice was that eating outside was much safer than eating in. That meant a proliferation of tables outside. Some places became take away only, even pubs.
This scheme involved the government subsidising food and non-alcoholic drinks at participating cafes, pubs, and restaurants at 50%, up to £10 per person (per order). The offer was available during the month of August 2020, from Monday to Wednesday each week. The idea was to support the entertainment industry, which was badly hit by lockdown, and to encourage people to leave their houses, and start normal life again.
There has been criticism of this scheme. It encouraged people to meet each other, and you can't eat in a mask! The Covid figures certainly went up in September 2020 (although that might have been a new variant, or cooler weather). Also, while meals sold went up for Monday to Wednesday, they dropped at the weekends. Why pay more unnecessarily? And since many people were working at home, or not working at all, there wasn't much difference between weekdays and weekends.
However, we certainly enjoyed it at the time! Everything in IRL (in Real Life) had been cancelled for months, and we were just desperate to have some entertainment which wasn't based round a screen. Here are a couple of Rishi meals that we had (the nickname was obvious...)
Cambridge Blue (pub): We ordered food at one place at the bar (socially distanced and masked, of course), were summoned by the blue button to collect the meal (still socially distanced and masked), and ate in the marquee (socially distanced, but we could take our masks off!)
Thrive (vehan cafe): We ordered at the front door and collected at the hatch (masked, socially distanced) and ate outside
We didn't catch Covid from this!
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© Jo Edkins 2024