It’s cold, dark, and windy down by Muizenberg beach front, we are troubled, the tension is high and the questions fill the wind. When are we going? Are there shops? Can we stay together? This is my home why must we move Kevin? I have no answers, I have not been here before in this lifetime and I urgently pull on any past life memories to guide me.

 

My questions are different to my compatriots. Can the system manage a displacement camp of 4000 street-hardened, damaged, addicted, ill, tattooed gangsters, mothers and children all coming down in the same place? Surely localised smaller groups are better managed? Will the system punish the damaged?

 

We have not seen a City doctor, social worker or anyone from the system. I have had to borrow PPE like gloves and masks and feel let down by the system and this worries me for the next solution. I have a Duty of Care for the next step I cannot hand over 55 people for them to die?

 

We laugh nervously, bellies filled from generosity, guilt and an excellent volunteer Chef, Brother Nirren, cooking up a storm in his food van. Wisdom tells me that good healthy food cooked with love is the best medicine for the broken, I place lots of effort sourcing the best meals. We have cooked oats or pap daily by the community and Can volunteers. Bread donated by Blue Ribbon, Dinners by the Muizenberg Community via the MID and Can, and lots of good people just reaching out and giving. There are many times I am here in the dark on my own, tattooed faces coming out of the darkness, stealth of a hunter, except their big smiles, give them away in the shadows. I have full trust and faith but now as the rumour of the move ripples through like the wind on the water, mothers clutch their babies closer for fear of been separated, old Lizzie cries she has only ever known Muizenberg, I reach out and touch her arm to reassure her. It’s late, its time to go…

You see this is a Rich Down disease, this is not a normal pandemic of the poor and we have a duty of care to protect the immune vulnerable. I have a Duty of Care to my 55 chommies and it worries me our system will punish the damaged. Soon our open-air camp will break as the trucks arrive to take them to the Displacement Camp. Somewhere deep a memory stirs, a past life terror watching the fearful faces depart in the back of army trucks.

To test the system we came up with the COVID-19 System Test.

10 Volunteers are asked 3 Questions and a profile photo.

1. How did you get here?

2. If the world rebooted tomorrow how would you make it different?

In 6 months’ time once the storm has blown over and the dust settled, I will attempt to find each one and ask them the final question.

3. What you have you done in the last 6 months?

COVID-19 System Test is out of 10.

Meet Jamien.

Q1. I have a big family but…..