I was browbeaten into getting the two doses in Moscow by the Moscow city administration, which had virtually put me under house arrest for a while as I am an elderly resident. They blocked my social card that allowed me to use public transport free of charge. I managed to flee Moscow and live at our place in the country: better under house arrest there than in the Moscow city centre. My wife, however, was told that if she didn't take the two doses, she would be fired. She's an English teacher at a state school. She had to line up in a local park, where mass inoculations were undertaken. So right at the very end of the of the whole Covid Show here, late last October, I had the 2 doses, and got my QR code that, wonder of wonders, afforded me entry to bars, theatres, restaurants etc. — places that I had long ago ceased to frequent. And shortly thereafter, suddenly, as if by magic, the whole shit show ended: no more restrictions, no dire warnings of the approaching Grim Reaper of the Plague. All history now.
I visited Hong Kong in 2008 aboard HMCS REGINA; I loved the city immediately and while it was out of this world as far as the cost of living for residents, staying as a guest was surprisingly affordable and street food was cheap.
The western world is still not ready to concede that it has been had and the millions upon millions of 'doses' western countries bought really didn't 'save millions of lives'. There are fewer better examples of donkeyhood than Canada, where Trudeau the Younger bought something like 75 million doses for a population of about 35 million. There was a spastic attempt to give some away at the last minute because they were within weeks of expiry, but the poor third-world victims weren't having any and guessed correctly that Canada only wanted to get someone else to throw them away. I think that was the Astra-Zeneca, which nobody trusted very much.
I'll tell you what the pandemic did for me - it completely changed the way I look at the country I live in, forever. I watched people I would have credited with better sense shout angrily that mandatory vaccination must be employed to make the vacillators and holdouts get the shot. If they only menaced themselves, they could do as they pleased, but 'this virus' was going to kill other people and those walking germ incubators could not be allowed free will so long as their sickness menaced others. A majority was said to support 'vaccine passes' which would allow you to enter a restaurant or movie theatre with other right-thinking people who were proud to 'do their duty for the community', and a survey taken weeks later reported the concept had 'taken well' and even more people supported it; wanted it to continue even after the 'pandemic' was over.
In the end I got the initial two doses, because Transport Canada ordered a vaccine mandate and those who wouldn't take it would be placed on indefinite unpaid leave and eventually let go. A very few where I work held out and would not accept 'vaccination', and they were eventually called back to work without any repercussions at all. But I would have had to hang tight for another two months without work, and I have a family to support.
So now I have arrived at a place where I basically care nothing for other people with the exception of people I know well; any sense of 'community' or 'national unity' is gone, and I couldn't care less if the place is run by Trudeau or the disinterred corpse of Lenin. I don't feel any obligation to anyone else or any 'higher calling', and pay little to no attention to national politics except to marvel at the idiocy of the present leaders and observe much of the same among the opposition.
I was browbeaten into getting the two doses in Moscow by the Moscow city administration, which had virtually put me under house arrest for a while as I am an elderly resident. They blocked my social card that allowed me to use public transport free of charge. I managed to flee Moscow and live at our place in the country: better under house arrest there than in the Moscow city centre. My wife, however, was told that if she didn't take the two doses, she would be fired. She's an English teacher at a state school. She had to line up in a local park, where mass inoculations were undertaken. So right at the very end of the of the whole Covid Show here, late last October, I had the 2 doses, and got my QR code that, wonder of wonders, afforded me entry to bars, theatres, restaurants etc. — places that I had long ago ceased to frequent. And shortly thereafter, suddenly, as if by magic, the whole shit show ended: no more restrictions, no dire warnings of the approaching Grim Reaper of the Plague. All history now.
I visited Hong Kong in 2008 aboard HMCS REGINA; I loved the city immediately and while it was out of this world as far as the cost of living for residents, staying as a guest was surprisingly affordable and street food was cheap.
The western world is still not ready to concede that it has been had and the millions upon millions of 'doses' western countries bought really didn't 'save millions of lives'. There are fewer better examples of donkeyhood than Canada, where Trudeau the Younger bought something like 75 million doses for a population of about 35 million. There was a spastic attempt to give some away at the last minute because they were within weeks of expiry, but the poor third-world victims weren't having any and guessed correctly that Canada only wanted to get someone else to throw them away. I think that was the Astra-Zeneca, which nobody trusted very much.
I'll tell you what the pandemic did for me - it completely changed the way I look at the country I live in, forever. I watched people I would have credited with better sense shout angrily that mandatory vaccination must be employed to make the vacillators and holdouts get the shot. If they only menaced themselves, they could do as they pleased, but 'this virus' was going to kill other people and those walking germ incubators could not be allowed free will so long as their sickness menaced others. A majority was said to support 'vaccine passes' which would allow you to enter a restaurant or movie theatre with other right-thinking people who were proud to 'do their duty for the community', and a survey taken weeks later reported the concept had 'taken well' and even more people supported it; wanted it to continue even after the 'pandemic' was over.
In the end I got the initial two doses, because Transport Canada ordered a vaccine mandate and those who wouldn't take it would be placed on indefinite unpaid leave and eventually let go. A very few where I work held out and would not accept 'vaccination', and they were eventually called back to work without any repercussions at all. But I would have had to hang tight for another two months without work, and I have a family to support.
So now I have arrived at a place where I basically care nothing for other people with the exception of people I know well; any sense of 'community' or 'national unity' is gone, and I couldn't care less if the place is run by Trudeau or the disinterred corpse of Lenin. I don't feel any obligation to anyone else or any 'higher calling', and pay little to no attention to national politics except to marvel at the idiocy of the present leaders and observe much of the same among the opposition.