I won't say much about the covid situation, as I went through the latest dire stats only yesterday.

Suffice it to say that by the time we got to last month's review, Malaysia's covid death toll had gone beyond 5,000, and today, just a few short weeks later, we're staring 9,000 in the face (total deaths as of yesterday: 8,859)... On 2 July, the seven-day average for covid fatalities was 75; on 30 July, it was 163. Despite Malaysia's heroic vaccination efforts, therefore, we're far from being out of these dark woods.

On Wednesday 14, however, after 46 days of MCO, Sarawak entered "Phase 2" (we're not calling them movement control orders any more; they're now "phases" in the "National Recovery Plan"...)

We're enjoying being able to walk a bit further, but we still can't leave Kuching, "tourist activities" are still not permitted, and although we're allowed to eat out now, we don't (we're still awaiting our second vaccination).


There have been several sobering anniversaries this month.

It's a year since we've seen any of our family, and of course there's one of them we'll never see again. It's a year since we returned to Sarawak, with all the mixture of feelings that has involved. It's a year since we've set foot on an aeroplane (not in itself a bad thing, but without braving these ghastly, germ-ridden crates, family and friends far away remain inaccessible). It's a year since we tested positive for covid (and I really didn't think that a whole year later, I'd still be worrying about catching this damn thing, mutated and doubly malevolent -- but alas that anxiety is still with us).

Fortunately, the month has also been enlivened by some more straightforward anniversaries: Tynwald Day, our wedding anniversary, and Sarawak Day. Every such event gets super-celebration treatment with us at the moment, with several days of festivities.


And, of course, the daily rounds continue. Vintage Travel is continuing to have a fallow phase, but The Velvet Cushion has been busy. There have been three screen posts (on asylum-seekers, Australian First Nations people, and weddings); a language post (on the theory of comprehensible input); and three discussions of novels (The Spirit of my Fathers Keeps Climbing in the Rain, about the "disappeared" in Argentina; Pachinko, about the Korean community in Japan; and Promise at Dawn, about the life, times, and inventions of French author Romain Gary).

I continue to be enormously thankful for books, films, and the multifarious riches of the Internet.

Despite the worsening covid situation, and all the reminders of the disappearance of a year, July has been a better month than June. It has been great to have the restrictions on our walking removed. Our second vaccination is now on the horizon, and with it -- hopefully, eventually, carefully, always depending on circumstances -- a way out of this holding pattern.

May it be...