Herostratic fame

In the outskirts of of Selcuk, in Turkey, on the way to the nearby ruins of the city of Ephesus, you can visit the meager leftovers ofthe ancient Temple of Artemis. 

Not much stands of what was one of the Seven Wonders of the ancient world: a lone columns reconstructed by the remains found at the site is a poor witness to its greatness. I visited the site in 2014. Besides the fascination of standing at a place with such a history (the Greek scholar from the Library of Alexandria, Callimachus said that the earliest temple at the site was started by the Amazons and was destroyed by a flood in the 7th century BC), the demise of the second Temple of Artemis remains a relevant story, as it is about the human narcissism that seems to have reached its peak nowadays!

The Second Temple of Artemis was constructed around the 6th Century BC, under a Cretan father-son architectural team: Chersiphron and Metagenes. The building was at the forefront of architecture and justly considered a wonder. It was the first temple built purely of marble and its proportions were enormous: 115 meters long, 46 meters wide, and with massive 13-meter high columns. 

The temple was destroyed by a fire on July 20th 356 BC, on the birth day of Alexander the Great. In an act of arson, a young man set fire to the temple wanting his name to be remembered forever! The young narcissist was captured, confessed, and was executed for his crime, and to punish him for all time, the Ephesians forbid anyone to ever pronounce his name under the penalty of death. 

The Ephesians reconstructed the temple. It stood for more than 600 years until it was seriously damaged by a Goth army in 256 AD, and then slowly decayed into oblivion with the ascent of Christianity in the 5th Century AD (only in 1869 the site was rediscovered by a British expedition). On the other hand, the young man was not condemned to oblivion: more than 2000 years later his name, Herostratus, still lives on. In fact, the term "Herostratic fame" refers to people's urge to be famous at any cost, a tendency that seems very alive today!

One year of the Pandemic

In February 2020 I was in Brussels. I saw friends I had been with in Liberia in 2015, after the Ebola pandemic that caused fear in the world and closed down three West African countries. We spoke about the new virus we were hearing about - Corona. The first cases had been diagnosed in Belgium, as the virus, which had started in China, seemed to be spreading around the world. We wondered if the effects would be just like Ebola, and I must admit that I thought, “no! Come on! Europe is well-prepared”.
One year later I can reflect on the fact that I was completely wrong about Europe’s (or anyone’s) level of preparedness.

I just made it back to El Salvador on February 28th 2020, via Madrid, which was already registering the first cases of what would be one of the worst outbreaks in the world. And I made it back just before the world started closing down. In El Salvador, lockdowns were imposed on March 18th, the same day I had a surgery (in an empty hospital, where they were preparing for what they almost described as an apocalyptic onslaught). I returned home the next day, and started what for me was a long and stressful lockdown.
I am not comparing myself to anyone; I know I am privileged, living in a large house, and with a job that provides me with all the amenities to make a lockdown bearable. And I am comfortable being alone, taking advantage of the time in terms of reading books, playing computer games, drawing, making  movies and distance learning.
Nevertheless, it was hard. I did go through long moments of lonely desperation; worrying like crazy about my family; missing the liberty of movement, of casually going out for a beer or just for a walks. Not planning any longer for my next adventure trip, but trying to be optimistic about when we could turn the corner and return to normality.

After nearly six months of lockdown, I managed to travel to an carefully opening Denmark. While airports in Houston, Frankfurt and Mexico, which I traveled through, were largely empty, there was a clear optimism that the worst part of the pandemic was over. In Denmark I saw family and friends; I even went out in Copenhagen one night where it was impossible to find a seat in a city that seemed happy and largely normal except for the masks.
How wrong we all were yet again.
Only six weeks later I managed to travel back to Denmark. Madrid and Frankfurt airports, normally so busy in the Christmas period, were completely closed as cases were spiking. Only a couple of days into my vacation, isolated in a summer-cabin, Denmark closed down again, throughout Christmas. I had to be tested before leaving my isolation and seeing my parents, and all instances of seeing friends were cancelled as the contagion spread as it had not done before. As for everyone, it was a strange Christmas, but I was as happy as I have ever been that I least got to spend it with my parents.

Returning to San Salvador, I passed through Madrid for a 14 hours layover. I took a walk downtown and saw a busy and crowded city in a country that continued to be ravaged by the virus. Maybe societies do only have themselves to blame for contagion. Maybe infection is the punishment for carelessness. 

I have been back nearly three months in San Salvador. I spend my time between the office and work. I go to the office a couple of days every week, wearing masks and keeping social distance (Why is it social distance? Should it not just be physical distance?).
I stay home, doing the same routines that I did during the worst part of the lockdown, and barely leaving the now-comfortable safety and solitude of my home. 

One year away, I have to admit that I have changed: I miss traveling, but I am a bit weary whenever I leave the security of my home. I am not able to relate normally with people, as I have nearly forgotten how to have a physical and casual conversation. I have not really touched any other human for more than a year; no hugs, kisses or even a handshake. And I have reflected much more about death, which seems ever looming in a world where every topic seems linked to our impending doom, of which the virus is only one symptom.

The vaccines are here, and that initially gave some renewed hope. However, as was foreseen already by The Economist, the advent of the vaccines would also mean the advent of vaccine-politics: who gets the vaccines, who pays, how are they distributed. The hope of the vaccines has thus been replaced by disillusioned pessimism about humanity’s capacity to even organise a fair and efficient vaccination programme. 

If we cannot even do this, how are we going to tackle more pressing problems?

So here we are, one year later, and while an end could be hoped for, it is impossible to feel a sense that all this will mean a better world, a better future, not to say the minimal return to a pre-COVID normality that soon will be nothing but nostalgic memories of a bygone time….