Melbourne’s Stage Four Lockdown
Over 60 days of the strictest social distancing restrictions in the world in Melbourne, Australia.
Melbourne is Australia’s second most populated city, culturally comparable to San Francisco in the early 1990’s, and commonly overlooked by the tourists who crowd Sydney’s Harbor and Opera House, but Melbourne is the diamond in the rough. The city’s vibrant laneways filled with live music all summer, change venues without skipping a beat to fireplaces in homes, bars, and backyards during the colder months. The winters are dark, cold, wet, and for three months Melbourne bears a striking resembles to Gotham City, but this winter persona is a façade. Behind the closed doors of the lifeless, empty looking buildings, jackets are stripped off and dancefloors full because nothing keeps Melbournians from socializing; nothing except the strictest pandemic lockdown in the (present) world.
The reaction from the Australian government hasn’t been flawless, and it’s a bit too much to ask for a perfect pandemic performance but compared to similar countries Australia has excelled in testing, tracing, and isolating Covid. Unfortunately, a few mistakes and bad luck, gave the very contagious virus the upper hand in Melbourne. As it quietly infected hundreds and travelled to rural areas of Victoria, Australians were…
