ドイツの旧友から久しぶりにメールが届いた。
中部ドイツの古くからの町に住む彼女は、近況を次のように伝えてきた。
ドイツでは、八千人の死者が出たが、それでも他の欧米諸国よりはマシで、現在は収束に向かっているが、街にはまだ活気がない。家族には60%相当の休業補償金が出た。夏の恒例のフランス旅行は、中止になった等々、近況がつづられている。
Dear 〇〇,
finally I thank you for your pics from Fuji and the cherry blossoms around.
You really can be happy to go there for a little spin with the new car.
So I assume you and your wife are well and ba good health.
I read that the confinement is over meanwhile after a second wave of the epidemic, so you can go outside with a quiet conscience?
Only the Olympic Games have become a victim of corona, I wish Japan a second start-up next year!
In Germany it looks as if the worst is over meanwhile - after more than 8000 deaths and so many restrictions in every days' life.
But however, it's better here than in so many other states in Europe - and both Americas - north and south.
As we are retired persons since many years (P〇 since 11 years ud I since 5 years) there are no direct financial losses.
But H〇〇, our daughter and her husband M〇〇 both work short time, H〇〇 the third month meanwhile and M〇〇 "only" one month.
That means that they get only 60% of their wage. But it last, they are kept in their jobs.
But so many shops and trades are very dull as nobody came to buy and nobody could spend money in culture: performances, music, opera, cinema,
art in general could not be offered. Slowly life comes back into town, but always with restrictions.
But we are happy to live in a spacious house with a nice garden around. So we are not locked in.
And for me and my camera it was (and still is) a good opportuniy to take some pics - mostly close-ups:
Our summer holidays were cancelled too of course, but it seems we can go to "our" small town in south France in october instead.
Our hosts agreed, so we are looking to autumn in France. We never were there in that season, well - wait and see what happens.
Perhaps this crisis makes some people think more about environment and what is really important in our lifes,
as it can be menaced so suddenly an so unexpected.
My best wishes to you,
your old friend 〇〇〇
