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The Current Transcript for May 18, 2020

Host: Matt Galloway

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

[Music: theme]

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: So we're coming to this really important part of the gardening season where it's a really popular time. May long weekend, go to the garden centre and spend your holiday Monday gardening.

MATT GALLOWAY: It is indeed a holiday Monday in much of this country and for many, the traditional start of the gardening season. Of course, nothing about this spring is normal. And yet, with more time on their hands, more Canadians than ever are getting those hands into the soil and planting something. The meditative benefits of growing things from the ground up coming up. Also, if you're stuck in your 500 square foot condo, riding this pandemic out, you might think that isolation on a sailboat in the Caribbean would be the ideal place to be during a crisis like this. Maybe not.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: I don't want to brag, but, you know, having a Canadian flag helps so much. We're so approachable as Canadians. It's not as though I've been totally away from friends and family. I've made new friends.

MG: How a sailor from P.E.I. stuck in Martinique is hoping to sail home solo through the Atlantic as hurricane season approaches. Plus, as promised, Stuart McLean and Vinyl Cafe classic, "Odd Jobs." That's in an hour. But we begin in Germany, whereas life comes back to normal, work is already underway to prevent a second wave of COVID-19. Good morning. I'm Matt Galloway and this is The Current.

[Music: theme]

As countries around the world reopen, fears of a second wave rise

Guests: Tobias Kurth, Justin Fendos, Raywat Deonandan

SOUNDCLIP

[Sounds from protests in Berlin]

VOICE 1: This is all a deprivation of liberty. It's manipulating people and frightening entire groups of society.

VOICE 2: We can't be beaten down and have our fundamental rights taken away.

MG: The sound of COVID-19 lockdown protesters clashing with police over the weekend in Berlin. Germany, like many other places, is slowly lifting restrictions on its citizens. We've all been sacrificing our movements for months now, avoiding family and friends and our desire to do simple things like go out for a cup of coffee. But as these restrictions are being lifted, there is a sense of unease. The fear that this could cause new outbreaks. How big is the risk of a second or even third wave of infections? Well to try to answer that, we are going to take a trip around the world, starting in Germany, then over to South Korea and finally, home to Canada. Dr. Tobias Kurth is a professor of public health and epidemiology at the Charite Hospital in Berlin. Doctor, good morning.

TOBIAS KURTH: Good morning from Berlin.

MG: We hear the sounds of those protests. Why are people protesting on the streets of Berlin and other cities across Germany over the weekend?

TOBIAS KURTH: Well, there's some people protesting because they feel that the restrictions have been too hard and that the lifting is not going too fast. So they are afraid that the government is not measuring well and applying measures that are really affecting social life and other aspects of their life. On the other hand, obviously it is important to keep the infection rates low and to prevent the future in a way that we are not overburdened health care system.

MG: We see these photos from Germany and people are out in parks and sitting in cafes. How much of that country has reopened so far?

TOBIAS KURTH: Well, in Berlin, there's actually quite a nice feeling if you go out and if you sit in the park and keep distance, there's nothing wrong with it. So many people wear out. And I myself also took a nice day for a walk and also went to a restaurant. And I was quite amazed that most people actually accept the distance and the measures are in place. So we are enjoying life again in Berlin slowly.

MG: What's sort of in the midst of the easing of those restrictions, has there been a spike in covered cases over the last couple of weeks?

TOBIAS KURTH: No, there has not been hit by a car, luckily. So the numbers have been quite stable and actually lowering over the last day. So that's a good sign that the slow lifting of the measures actually is working and we all watching very carefully and closely to further developments to prevent a second wave.

MG: Germany is being held up as a model in many ways for how to tackle this crisis. Do you think that that is merited? That reputation?

TOBIAS KURTH: Well, I think Germany on one hand, you can say was lucky because we saw what was coming and the scientists and politicians discussed well in the background and then applied measures when necessary and also now the opening I think happened to the right time. And the healthcare system was also prepared for it. So it cannot be transferred easily to other settings, but certainly for Germany, this model has worked so far very well.

MG: Your sense is that the country has done well in controlling the outbreak.

TOBIAS KURTH: I think so. So health care system was not overburdened. We see that people dying, of course, from the disease, unfortunately, but not so many people as in other regions in Europe and the world.

MG: One of the things that people have pointed to in terms of something that they're concerned about is the not so much a lack of testing, but that the testing hasn't gone far enough, that it's not as extensive enough, perhaps, as it needs to be as these restrictions are lifted. Is enough testing being done in Germany right now?

TOBIAS KURTH: That's the important question. So, yes, we need to keep on testing, but we also need to keep on testing smartly. That means we need to identify clusters, those with symptoms for sure, and also those who are in contact with people who have been infected. So that's that's the key to really identify those people who are at risk. Test them, isolate them and then lift the measures as we speak. So testing is really an important key. And the laboratories as well as to the resources, are not available to test a large number of people every day.

MG: But is that happening already or is that something that you want to see?

TOBIAS KURTH: It's it's increasing every day, pretty much. So we are not to an optimum. Right now, we are increasing the number of tests still. But so far, I think we're doing well in being able to identify clusters on the population level.

MG: The other issue is that the borders are still open and people are able to travel into Germany. We've heard of restrictions. For example, when people fly into Hong Kong, they're put into a mandatory quarantine for 14 days. There's extensive work that's done to figure out who they are. They're given a wristband that would track them. That's not happening at all in Germany. What happens if you arrive back in the country?

TOBIAS KURTH: Well, actually, the borders have been closed. So if you arrive from another country outside from Germany, you would be put in a 14 day quarantine. And even the European countries or their direct borders have been closed. They're reopening now very, very slowly. So I think I think that was also important to really keep an eye on that. But it's also important now to allow travel again into Germany and out of Germany.

MG: It's not a mandatory quarantine, is it? That you're asked to go into quarantine? I guess the concern is that people.

TOBIAS KURTH: You ask to put into quarantine, the question is how strict you actually check whether you stay home or not? That certainly is different in other countries, but in Germany, that's correct.

MG: Is there a sense of trust in the German people to get this right? Is that how you would define kind of how this is being approached?

TOBIAS KURTH: I think it's important to work with the population, to trust in the population and to really communicate well what is going on. Now, some people obviously have their own opinion, but you need to trust the people because we only can do this together. It doesn't make any sense if if the government says you have to that will certainly not work well in Germany.

MG: How concerned are you that as the restrictions start to ease and as people go out and normal life begins to be more commonplace, that we could see a second wave of infections?

TOBIAS KURTH: Important to understand that the virus is still out there, obviously. So if you open up and if more people are mingling, if you wish, then there is a certain risk of a second infection. That's why testing is so important to really see if something changes. And watching all these numbers that many people learned over the last weeks. But I think everybody is on alert. So we will notice as soon as something's happening and then we need to think if we need to change the way we're dealing with the virus right now on the population level.

MG: What do you think that countries like Canada could learn from Germany's experience in many ways? You're ahead of us. I mean, the idea that we could go out as you have done to a restaurant seems almost far fetched right now. So what is it that a country like Canada could learn from where Germany is?

TOBIAS KURTH: Well, I think that looking at the numbers in each country is important to understand the settings and the culture of each each country and working with the people, it's important explaining to the people what is going on. What are the risk of what is what is possible, what is not possible? And then really, you know, looking at Germany, that things are possible, going out again, enjoying the sun, enjoying the parks and drawing restaurant if possible. If you behave in certain, certain way. So keeping the distance, so having some of the hygiene measures in place that we all have learned over the last weeks. So maybe that is a good information that things are possible. And I'm sure that the Canadians are able to also do this like we can do this in Germany.

MG: Doctor, good to speak with you. Thank you so much.

TOBIAS KURTH: Thank you. Have a good day.

MG: And you. Dr. Tobias Kurth is a professor of public health and epidemiology at the Charite Hospital in Berlin. From Germany to South Korea, where until recently the spread of COVID-19 appeared to be well under control. Justin Fendos is a professor of cell biology at Dongseo University and is in the city right now of Busan. Justin, good morning to you.

JUSTIN FENDOS: Good morning. Thank you for having me.

MG: Thanks for joining us. South Korea, we know, was again ahead of the curve hit early by this virus, but the impression was that it had been essentially eliminated over the last couple of months. And then as we talked about on this program, nightclubs were allowed to open. What happened after that?

JUSTIN FENDOS: Yeah, so it sure looked like they had really eradicated the epidemic at one point for about two week stretch, we had daily infected individuals in the single digits, 80 plus percent of them were people coming in from overseas. So looked really good. And then we had this one gentleman who unfortunately visited five clubs in a span of 24 hours. And from that incident, we now have a couple hundred that have been diagnosed and about 1500 that have been tested related to that incident. So I guess if I was to describe the mood, it's cautious optimism because they really jumped on it very early. And at one point, they even had 7000 police officers across the country trying to find the people who might be connected, but we still need to wait and see.

MG: Tell me more about that effort to try to track everybody down. What did public health officials do?

JUSTIN FENDOS: Right. So one of things Korea has been very good at is the contact tracing. So they've been collecting different forms of information. The three most common types are electronic transaction records. So whenever you use your credit card or step on a bus, you use your credit card or something else in a cashless format. So they have a lot of that information which they typically had used for money laundering, tickets, money laundering and tax evaders. And so they repurpose that to see where people are in a retroactive sense. So if, for instance, I was diagnosed today as being a patient, they would look at my transaction records to see which restaurants, which coffee shops I went to. Another type of information that they liked to use. Are these mobile phone location logs. So whenever your phone connects, it connects to a power and these powers are dispersed throughout a geographical location. And so as you move through the city, your phone connects to different powers as you move and that creates a log of approximate locations of which neighbourhood you're in. And so this also has strong retroactive tracing value because you can tell you approximately what areas you have visited. And then the third type they use are the surveillance camera footage. And usually with these, they can get, you know, down to the minutes. What when you entered a coffee shop and when you left, who sat close to you? And so especially with the the third part, the third form of information, they can quickly identify the people who are sitting near you and, you know, give them phone calls as soon as you've been diagnosed to let them know quickly that, hey, you know, you're in a situation of risk. Please come in and get checked.

MG: There was criticism that some of those measures targeted, in particular the LGBTQ community saying that that community was responsible for this sudden resurgence in the virus. What's being done to mitigate that concern and to make sure that people's privacy isn't being violated?

JUSTIN FENDOS: Right. So privacy obviously is a very important thing. And just to be clear, these tracing methods are not specifically targeted to any demographic. You know, the rules apply to everybody. There's also a strong transparency component that's written into the protocols. So anonymized date data is made publicly available so people can use it to, you know, check their media environment and assess their own risk. So there isn't any specific demographic targeting. There have been some cases, though, where, for instance, there was one city where two people got diagnosed on the same day and there weren't any other people diagnosed during that week. And so based on the trace records, people were kind of able to piece together, maybe these two people were having an affair because they both people haven't do visit the same place at the same time, even though one of them was mentioned as later having departed from one of these places with their spouse. So this suggested that the other person wasn't their spouse. So there have been some of these situations where anonymized data has created some kind of privacy concern, but other than that, because it is an itemized Koreans have, their buy in has been very good. And, you know, there haven't been anybody up in arms about it. And as I mentioned earlier, this type of information was already information that was being collected by law enforcement for other purposes to track criminals or to catch tax evaders. And so what Korea has done is essentially just repurpose existing information.

MG: Just a few seconds left. Is there anything that you think in terms of what's happening there that a country like Canada could take from? Same question that I asked the doctor in Germany.

JUSTIN FENDOS: Right. So testing, obviously, you can never have too much of it. And you're always not going to have enough. You're not going to have enough tests to test everybody. And so one of the things that's really powerful contact tracing is it allows you to link together the results in a very powerful commentary manner so that when as soon as you get a testing result, you can use that to identify people who probably should get tested next. And so there's a strong connection between that initial test and the predictive value of trying to test people who have the highest risk of being infected. And I think that's something that a lot of countries, in addition to the privacy concerns, really should be looking at very closely.

MG: Justin, good to speak with you. Thank you.

JUSTIN FENDOS: Thank you very much.

MG: Justin Fendos, a professor of cell biology at Dongseo University, was in Busan, South Korea.

JUSTIN FENDOS: Well, from Korea, we head back to Canada.

SOUNDCLIP

[Sounds from anti-lockdown protests in Toronto]

MG: And it's here that we saw more anti lockdown protests outside the provincial legislature in Toronto over the weekend. Most protesters were not wearing masks, not practicing social distancing and so how concerned should we be as we continue to move through this first wave, about a second wave of potential infections here? Raywat Deonandan and in is an epidemiologist in the faculty of Health Sciences at the University of Ottawa. Raywat, good morning to you.

RAYWAT DEONANDAN: Good morning.

MG: If you listen to what's going on in Germany and also in South Korea, what do you take from where those countries are at right now and in fighting this virus?

RAYWAT DEONANDAN: There is a lot to take away from what we just heard. First is that there's difficulty in translating the tools and experiences across different political cultures because different different tolerances of authoritarian intervention, one might say, well, we need to apply are technological innovations that have been experienced in other countries to our own situation. We don't get through this unless we have extremes, amounts of contact tracing. And like the South Korean methodology, I do wonder how much our population is willing to tolerate that amount of intrusion into lives.

MG: As we move through this there is and we heard it in those various countries, a sense of in some ways lockdown fatigue, where people just want to get back to their normal lives or as close to normal as possible. How concerned in the midst of that are you about a second wave of infections emerging?

RAYWAT DEONANDAN: It's the biggest issue because we've been focused on the epidemiology of this, but we really should focus on the psychology as well and the sociology and the political science. If we don't get buy in from the population to be compliant with our public health plans, the risk of a second wave increases dramatically. We get through this after the end of the first wave by clamping down with some serious public health infrastructure, meaning the population has to be on board with sustained long term physical distancing and other measures to reduce the probability of transmission. And if we start getting complacent or angry about this situation, then the probability of a second wave manifesting earlier and harder is increased dramatically.

MG: Justin was talking about the importance of contact tracing. And we heard as well in Germany concerns around on testing. The testing perhaps isn't as widespread as it needs to be. Where are we at in this country with testing? Are we doing anywhere near the amount of testing or the smart kind of testing that we need to be doing?

RAYWAT DEONANDAN: Well, we're doing a lot of testing. If we compare in South Korea and Germany, Canada has about 33 tests per thousand people and Germany has about 37 tests per thousand people. So we're on par. What we don't have is these strategic kinds of testing that we need. Currently, we're testing symptomatic people and that criterion is being lessened every day. We're testing lesser and lesser symptomatic people to widen our capture radius. But we need to do is in addition, do some random screening of the population to implement a genuine surveillance system. That way we can detect cases in something resembling real time as the economy opens and hopefully descend upon those cases with overwhelming public health force and prevent them from becoming outbreaks and prevent outbreaks from becoming epidemics.

MG: Do you think we have as a society the tolerance for that kind of surveillance? You raised the issue of privacy and what other countries can do versus what candidate can do? Can we do that in this country?

RAYWAT DEONANDAN: I have to say, yes. We're not South Korea, we haven't gotten that culture. We're probably closer to Germany. And we want to think of ourselves through media as being closer to the US with this liberty independence mindset. I don't think we are that. I think Canadians have a more community partnership mindset. And if we focus on bringing in the population as partners in this endeavour, we stand a better chance of having buy into our plans. So I would like to see more transparency in how we communicate with the public, what our expectations are, what our resources are, and show them the probability of a second wave happening if we don't do what needs to be done. So that involves obviously rolling out the technologies.

MG: How do you avoid moving too quickly? I mean the province of Ontario is largely going through its reopening starting on Tuesday, yet it has not hit the targets that the premier himself set out in terms of the number of infections. It's still above that on a daily basis. So how do you avoid going too quickly on this?

RAYWAT DEONANDAN: Well, that's a political question. I don't know the answer to that. I do think, though, that we need to deploy the appropriate public health infrastructure. We have to avoid is having these decisions being made politically and economically and not scientifically. We need to have all the voices at the table, not just one branch of one science. Everyone must have a voice, but it must be driven by public health needs, not economic needs.

MG: It does feel across the country like we're moving into a different phase of this story. And so what is the thing, if I can put it this way, that keeps you up at night as we move into that new phase?

RAYWAT DEONANDAN: Well, what keeps me up at night is flagmancy of the public health rules. I'm all for opening up the economy. It has to be done eventually. You know, sooner is better than later because it will come a point where the public health consequences of a depressed economy equal then exceed the public health consequences of a raging disease. So we have to open up, but we have to do it smartly. And so what keeps me up at night is do we have the infrastructure to do it smartly and safely? Are we doing everything in our power to acquire the testing, to open up the lab capacity, to get the technology like the contact tracing apps ready to go? Are we deploying public health communications to explain to the population that this is what needs to be done? I don't get a sense that the citizens understand the true risk. And I also get a sense that those who do understand it are overestimating individual risk. What's missing from the messaging is this has never been about individual risk. It's always been about community risk. So the risk to us individually stepping out into the world is still small. But the risk when scaled up to the population level is that we overrun our health care system. So coming forward, we have to balance that messaging. This is a terrifying disease, but for the population, not individuals. And so I'm concerned that we're growing to fear our fellow citizenss.

MG: We'll leave it there. Raywat, it's good to speak with you. Thank you.

RAYWAT DEONANDAN: Thank you.

MG: Rawat Deonandan, epidemiologist at the Faculty of Health Sciences at the University of Ottawa. The CBC News is next and then we're heading to the garden. What should you be planting? We'll give you some suggestions. Coming up. I'm Matt Galloway. This is The Current on CBC Radio One.

[Music]

Gardening can help you keep calm in time of pandemic

Guests: Nayanthi Wijesuriy, Sophia Xue, Natalie Gougen

MG: Good morning. I'm Matt Galloway. You're listening to The Current.

[Music: theme]

MG: Racing for safe harbour. Still to come, we'll hear from a sailor from P.E.I. trying to outrun hurricane season after being stuck for months in the Caribbean. But first, are green thumbs the new COVID symptom?

[Music: theme]

MG: All this isolation has some people digging up old pastimes and it's seeding new hobbies with others. Gardening has always been a particularly popular thing to do on this Victory Day long weekend. But as far as pandemic pastimes go, it's fair to say this one is blossoming. Some apartment dwellers in Toronto took a workshop via video conferencing about container gardening with expert green thumb, Lara Mrosovsky.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE 1: I think, Laura, I have questions on cutting. So basically I have a mint cutting in water since and almost two weeks. It is growing leaves, but not the white roots, which I see on like, you know, Google basically. So I'm wondering, should I plant it or it's been two weeks sitting in the water.

VOICE 2: Well, if it's growing leaves, that's always, you know, encouraging. It sounds like it's still alive and there's no like issue going on with its health. If you want to wait and kind of have more of the guarantee that you've seen those roots coming out and then transplant it, that could be good because, you know, the roots are there when you do put it in the soil.

VOICE 1: OK, I think I have like six to eight. I'll try half of them.

VOICE 2: Perfect. That's totally what I would do. Yeah, that's a great approach.

MG: Gardening expert Lara Mrosovsky holding an online workshop for people who live in a cluster of high rises in a neighbourhood just east of Toronto's downtown. Shreya Adva is one of the participants. Just moved to Canada last December and is taking this workshop to try to learn more about gardening for Canada's seasons.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE: The pandemic and everything, the summer vacationing sun has gone to toss. So I thought I might as well learnn something. I was always back home in India, we have a lot of sun. We had like abundance of water, sunlight and the seasonal stuff never was the limitation. So here basically Lara is helping a lot in terms of the seasonal stuff and sun and shade and everything. I have a little balcony and after Lara's session, I think I have now 13 plants almost and they are all in the germination stage. What I'm personally learning is because earlier I never used to garden from seeds. We have like nursery which is very cheap to get the grown up plants. So I'm teaching myself patience because every day I get up and see if I have like two leaves anywhere in the pot, so yeah.

MG: The gardening workshop is organised by a community centre known simply as The Corner. Nayanthi Wijesuriyr is with The Corner. Nayanthi, good morning.

NAYANTHI WIJESURIY: Good morning.

MG: Where did the idea for this workshop, the container gardening workshop, come from?

NAYANTHI WIJESURIY: Actually, this has started like since the St. Jamestown community corner was open to the public because we also as a agency we also values is to support the green initiative. Since like 2011, the St. Jamestown community corner was open to the community. We started like various ways to implement this great initiative in the community. So the balcony garden, because if you see the St. Jamestown community corner, St. Jamestown community is like a densely populated area and with 19 high rise buildings. So you hve to find a reason to like, you know, engage the community in different ways and also to support the green initiative. So we usually run annual spring gathering community consultation. Through those consultation also we hear this kind of like people need vertical gardening. So and also composting. So that way we also reach out to like different partners, other agencies to see whether they can support us to fund this kind of initiative.

MG: Do people understand that they could garden? As you mentioned, I mean, it's a vertical community. There's all the high rise towers that are there and did people perhaps initially think, well I need a backyard. I couldn't have a garden if I live in a tower.

NAYANTHI WIJESURIY: That's why I think our support was very important for them, because there's like a diverse community coming from different backgrounds, which they had primarily like, you know, just like, you know, ground to plant things. But they have no idea, like this is possible in your balcony. So that's why actually it's experts like, you know, like Lara comes in and then show them like this is, you can do this like, you know, in your balconies. And also the city of Toronto like environment energy division, have this kind of workshop providing balcony gardening. Grow your own food in your balcony. So this initiative actually bwe had in March that there was a two workshop for the community, grow their own food in your balcony. So we had this March 6 and 7 workshop. So there were like lots of like community members participated at this, our workshop. Like around 50 to 60 participants came into this workshop,

MG: What does it mean that people are able to grow their own food in that community? I mean, it's a community that has had issues with food insecurity before. So if someone is able to grow their own food, what does that mean to them?

NAYANTHI WIJESURIY: It means a lot to them, because you see that when we hear from the community, they say like when they see like plants and there's vegetables that they see from their plants. They feel like it's sort of like in are very like, you know, like you know, bring the smiles to their faces. And also like, if you see like it's a densely populated community and then you don't have much like a green space. But you see the greens like, you know, green in your balcony and it's soothing, calming them. Like it's more life for them to see, like, oh, this is great. Like, I can have this at my home. So I think it's in a way, it's also support in there. Like, you know, so it's also kind of a self-care like because these days our people are mostly staying at home. There's like no way of engaging and as an agency, we actually do it bring people together.

MG: What are people, just before I let you go, what are people growing?

NAYANTHI WIJESURIY: So they do like beans, potatoes, onion. Lots of like things that you can do in containers. They actually started growing. And if you see that like they kind of share that with us. It's kind of amazing the things that they have tried.

MG: Amazing.

NAYANTHI WIJESURIY: Yeah.

MG: Have you done any of this? Are you growing anything this spring?

NAYANTHI WIJESURIY: Yes, I have done. I have done actually seeds at this time. And also with my kids, I started doing the compost like we've made a compost bin. And yeah and also want to we learned last time, like how to make your own compost bin at home.

MG: Excellent. Nayanthi, happy gardening and thanks for talking to us.

NAYANTHI WIJESURIY: Thanks for having me. Thank you so much.

MG: Nayanthi Wijesuriy is with The Corner. It's in the neighbourhood of St. Jamestown in Toronto. Newbie gardeners are getting excited about things that they could grow even more experienced gardeners are looking at their plots a little differently this year because this is not a usual spring. Sophia Xue is the president of the Beaconsfield Garden Club in Montreal. This year, she's trying something new. Sophia, good morning to you.

SOPHIA XUE: Good morning, Matt. Thank you for having me.

MG: Thanks for joining us. What are you planting this year for the first time?

SOPHIA XUE: Well, this year, I was actually I mean, in May, I was actually hoping to go to Portugal, so I wasn't actually planning anything at all before. So now, with all the big changes. So I'm kind of catching up, trying to plant some vegetables. I had in my mind initially trying to get some Chinese green because I you know, we love the Chinese stir fries and everything and getting some seeds were very, very difficult this year. And I've tried to reach out to friends to try to get some seedlings. And it's essentially I was too late. I couldn't get anything. So I said, OK, what do I do? So I went to the local nurseries and I was able to find some really exotic plants that I can and I think I'm very happy. I'm very excited to try out. The first thing I got was okra.

MG: Oh, yeah.

SOPHIA XUE: And fIrst of all, I didn't even know that we can grow this here in our climate. I always think these Indian cuisine kind of needs very hot weather. Apparently, it grows very well here. And what I found out was okra is actually belongs to the same family as the hibiscus.

MG: I did not know that.

SOPHIA XUE: I didn't know either. It's got a beautiful, pale yellow big flowers. And when the flower falls off, we're actually eating the pods. That's what the okra is. And it's supposed to be quite prolific as long as you keep on clipping the pod and still coming back. So I'm really excited for that and to see how it works out.

MG: What are you finding in your community? I mean, you talked about trying to get seeds and one of the things we've heard across the country is that because people are spending so much time at home and, you know, they're worried about food insecurity, they're growing their own things. In your community are you finding that a lot of people perhaps who'd never garden before are getting their hands into the dirt?

SOPHIA XUE: Yes, absolutely. We are seeing a lot more people trying that for the first time. You know, gardening, I think I mean, you don't have to spend a lot of time in it, but it's really important that you spend a little bit time every day or every other day to maintain the garden. So for most people, you feel have a regular job. It's really challenging. You know, you leave early, you come back home late. So now, you know, a lot of people have the luxury of working from home, even though you still have the work. You know, if you take like 20 minutes every day from your work, you jump into your garden, does a little bit, I think it's very feasible. So I think a lot of people is looking at that. Now it becomes much more feasible thing for people to do.

MG: Nayanthi compared it to self-care. Do you find that when when you're gardening, I mean, especially in stressful times like this, it calms you down?

SOPHIA XUE: Absolutely. It absolutely calms down. What I find is very nice is I always compare gardening as yoga. I think it's very comparable because it's physical, first of all. And second of all, it's also, you know, when you garden all by yourself it's very zen and you kind of you know, you can choose not to do anything else. Just focus on yourself. Just let your mind go wild or you can you know, sometime I do is listen to podcast and listen to The Current podcast.

MG: Does that help with the gardening? I'm not sure. I'd like to believe it does, but I'm not sure.

SOPHIA XUE: Absolutely. Because, you know, I mean, normally, if you're you know, you're not really stressed, you want just to keep yourself occupied, so you do the gardening. You listen to music. You listen to podcast. But if you decide you wanted to get your brain a little bit, you know, relaxed, you do not have to do anything other than gardening and weeding, right. So it's really therapeutic for me in that sense. But I also find it's a good way of discipline yourself as well, in a way, because for gardening, you kind of have to, certain thing you have to do it a certain time. And you've got to be, you know, like regular visiting your garden. So I found it's a good way of really pushing myself, really, to take care of something that I actually plant.

MG: We just have a few seconds left. If somebody wants to get started on gardening and they've never done this before, but to your point, they have a lot of time and maybe they're looking for that zen moment, what's the one piece of advice that you'd give them as they go out this weekend?

SOPHIA XUE: I would say start with something like a new patch of land not going over an existing garden because that's really from my own experience, because I had, I bought the house, had a big garden. It became very overwhelming because you have no idea what's being planted before. So start with something small, brand new, so you know exactly what you're putting in and what to expect. So that way you kind of because the other way you're always catching up, right. Things coming out, you have no idea it's weed or it's a plant. But start with something small or something, you know, new piece of land and put in the flower or vegetable that you would like to grow.

MG: Excellent. Good luck with the okra.

SOPHIA XUE: Thank you. Thank you very much.

MG: Sophia Xue is the president of the Beaconsfield Garden Club in Montreal. There is something that has a long tradition in tough times. People plant vegetables in wartime with so-called victory gardens. In this pandemic, it's tempting for a whole bunch of reasons to get involved in something like that. It can offer you, as you heard, a little bit of rest and relaxation and you get some fruits and vegetables perhaps out of it as well. Natalie Gougen gardens virus or no virus. This year, though, she's planting a vegetable garden on the grounds of the Pioneer Estates Winery where she works. And Natalie is also the community coordination partner with the Garden Cities Project in Moncton. Natalie, good morning to you.

NATALIE GOUGEN: Good morning, Matt.

MG: Tell me what you're planning to plant in the vegetable garden this year.

NATALIE GOUGEN: Okay. Well, so as you mentioned, I wear many hats. So I work for the Garden Cities Project. As the committee coordinator. But I also work at the Pioneer Estates as an agricultural worker. And yeah just kind of got started where a few of us were talking about how we wishes we had more land to garden. Some people who work there do not own land, but they're, you know, they're great gardeners and they like to prepare some food for themselves and for the future. And so our boss, Sean Frazier, offered us a piece of the vinyard to garden on to grow vegetables.

MG: Nice. So what vegetables are you going to put into the ground?

NATALIE GOUGEN: Well, I can't speak for everybody. For me, it's going to be all about the root vegetables with that plot because they're pretty low maintenance. I have my own garden. I'm pretty privileged. I have my own garden at home and that's where the more high maintenance crops are going to go, because I'll be there, you know, morning and night, so I can keep an eye on them. But, yeah, I'll stay with the root vegetables over there.

MG: For people who you mentioned, you're lucky enough to have your own garden and now you have this extra space as well. There are people who don't have their own spaces, live in vertical communities, what have you and the community garden is such a big part of that. Tell me a bit about your involvement in the community gardens in Moncton.

NATALIE GOUGEN: Sure. Yeah, so we started in 2012 and we started a few, many gardens around Moncton and we now we kind of upgraded as our role, we're more here to assist the community gardens around Moncton and even over New Brunswick. So we kind of anybody who wants to start a community garden, we're always there to offer advice to help them find sometimes funding, help them find soil amendments, help them find seeds because we often get a lot of donations. One of the things you mentioned, vertical gardening where you've also this year, because of all these things that are going on, we have a new program, which is a wicking bed program. And a wicking bed is a special kind of container garden that kind of self waters itself. So we've got a program going on here in Moncton's. So if anybody is interested in that, please check out our page on Facebook, the Garden Cities Project. And so there's that. There's a new community garden starting up this spring near Victoria Park. And we're hoping also create permaculture demonstration garden this year. That all depends if we can find the right land for it, but it will basically be like a food forest to demonstrate to people that you can grow so many things, other vegetables if you own your land and if you want to.

MG: Like what?

NATALIE GOUGEN: Oh, like a fruit, you've got, not just apples. You get everything from plums and peaches, pears. There's some berries people kind of forget about, which are really easy to grow on your land.It can look pretty nice like a nice shrub. Cherries and then, of course, you get all the herbs that can kind of help with those. Some people kind of plant certain herbs at the feet of their fruit trees,to deter pests. And then you've got that thyme or that oregano to use in your food as well.

MG: Is your sense, we were talking about this earlier, that because of, as you say, the situation that we're in, in this pandemic and people go to the store and going to the grocery store now is, you know, filled with anxiety and a fraught experience, that we're thinking differently about food security. And the people want to have a greater role in their own food security?

NATALIE GOUGEN: Yeah, we are definitely thinking differently about food security, I think a big thing that happened was the whole toilet paper incident that happened in March, where if everybody flocks to the store thinking that we're running out of something, then that will definitely create a lack. Right? So if word got out that there's going to be a potato shortage, we could increase that shortage through panic. So people are trying to get a step ahead of that in planting their own potatoes, for example.

MG: If people have never done something like this before, they think they have a black thumb and that whatever they put in the ground is going to die, what advice would you give them? Perhaps an easy vegetable to start with that is difficult to kill.

NATALIE GOUGEN: Oh. Easy vegetables. That's a good question. There's so many, I find potatoes pretty easy myself. People really love kale. It kind of gives all year round. It's a green. Some people eat raw. It's better for you if it's cooked. Let's see, carrots if you get the right soil is pretty easy. But for me, it's fine, especially if you're a family with children, go for peas. Peas are easy. They'll add to your soil and the nitrogen. They're fun to plant and almost impossible to kill, as long as you make sure they don't dry out too much.

MG: Almost impossible to kill?

NATALIE GOUGEN: Well they're just, I find them so easy, they just. Yeah. You as long as you kind of keep an eye on them, that they don't get too dry. It's basically that they can handle the cold and they can handle the heat. So that's why I like peas.

MG: And you don't need to do anything. I mean you just really stick the seed in the ground and it doesn't even need to go too deep and away you go with the peas.

NATALIE GOUGEN: That's it. And also, it can go too deep. A lot of people make that mistake with sees when they're starting out, they plant them too deep. With peas because it's such a large seed, it's got that power to grow through a few inches of soil.

MG: I hope you've inspired people to take this on. It's not as difficult, perhaps as people might believe. And the benefits, when you're eating your own food, it's a remarkable thing. Natalie, thank you.

NATALIE GOUGEN: Thank you.

MG: Natalie Gougen teaches and works with the Garden Cities Project in Moncton, New Brunswick. Are you growing things? Are you finding that you have a pandemic victory garden underway? Maybe it's nothing special that you garden every year or maybe you're somebody who has taken Natalie's advice and thought, you know what, I'm going to try this because I have time on my hands and I'm worried about food security. How is your garden growing? What are you planting this year? You can let us know through the website cbc.ca/thecurrent. Click on the contact link. And if you're taking photos, as we gardeners often do of the things you're growing, you can share them with us on Facebook and on Twitter. Just look for @TheCurrentCBC.

Your letters

Guests: Karin Marley

MG: This is The Current. My name's Matt Galloway. Last week on the program we spoke about public toilets which are in short supply these days. Many are closed or inaccessible, and even when they open up, they may need some sort of redesign in order to encourage physical distancing and infection control. I spent a lot of time talking about toilets. Turns out that a lot of people were quite interested in this conversation. The Current's senior producer Karin Marley is here with some of your mail. Karin, good morning.

KARIN MARLEY: Good morning, Matt. Yeah, it was something that I hadn't thought about that much before, but my family loves to take long walks and now we're kind of limited by how long it is until someone needs to use the washroom, so.

MG: And there aren't washrooms out there.

KARIN MARLEY: Exactly. Hilary Whelton of Qualicum Beach, B.C., wrote: "In Paris they have self-cleaning public washrooms called sanisettes. They're enclosed plastic pods. Can't think why they're not used here.

MG: Joanne Endacott from Courtney, British Columbia wrote: "The conversation revolved mostly around men's needs in public washrooms. I would be very interested in a conversation from a woman's perspective." Good point. Thank you, Joanne.

KARIN MARLEY: We got this note from Margaret Hamilton in Saskatoon. "We must get rid of those hand dryers, especially the ones where you insert your hands into a mini wind tunnel. The air blasts aerosol form of water off of your hands. So many people don't actually use soap. They just get their hands wet and then stick them into the dryer. The dirty water from their hands gets blasted all over the room for the rest of us to inhale.

MG: Janet Beldman of London, Ontario, wrote, "I heard your report on public washrooms and noticed you did not mentioned transit drivers. They drive for 8 to 10 hours, depending on the shift. And when the pandemic struck, the washroom availability became scarce. Drivers cannot have a pail as the truckers might have. Some resorted to hiding in bushes. We need more accessible wash in places in the city that do not require going to the back of a coffee shop or a grocery store. In regular times, it was already an issue. Now it's a crisis. We also received a lot of reaction this past week to news that many Canadian universities would be delivering their classes, mostly online starting this fall.

KARIN MARLEY: Lana O'Brien in Armstrong, B.C. wrote, "As a parent and a high school teacher with kids in both high school and university, I, for one, would not send my first year student to a university this fall if learning were to continue online. I am a drama and choir teacher, and as one of your interviewees said, despite our best efforts, we are not able to provide the same teaching or learning experience through the computer." She continued "Despite our Herculean efforts to overhaul our courses from the ground up to accommodate different online platforms, I worry about the quality of our education for all students as we move through this pandemic.".

MG: Shubiba Mohammad wrote from Ottawa to tell us that she believes grad students are falling through the cracks during this pandemic. "I am a PhD student in my last year of study at the University of Ottawa in the School of Human Kinetics. My thesis work has been put on hold for the last two months as my work can only be done in a laboratory or hospital setting. And yet I am still required to pay full time tuition. Unortunately, many graduate students are not eligible for the current student aid being offered. No one is listening to our pleas and we are rapidly running out of options. I simply cannot quit or take a leave of absence so far into my degree." Thanks for all your letters and for getting in touch. You can reach us anytime through the website, cbc.ca/thecurrent. You can find us on Twitter as well or on Facebook. Just look for The Current CBC. Karin, thank you.

KARIN MARLEY: Thank you. Matt.

MG: Karin Marley, senior producer with The Current. Still to come, with many ports closed and borders harder to cross, sailing in international waters comes with new challenges during the pandemic and hurricane season is on its way as well. After the break, we'll hear from a Canadian sailor facing hurricanes and a pandemic on the high seas. I'm Matt Galloway. This is The Current on CBC Radio One. Stay with us.

[Music]

After COVID-19 turned his voyage into months of floating lockdown, this Canadian is finally sailing for home

Guests: Alan Mulholland

MG: Hi, I'm Matt Galloway, and you're listening to The Current. Many Canadians still haven't been able to make it home since the pandemic struck. And for Canadians sailing in international waters, they've been left with a tough choice try to wait it out wherever they happen to be or attempt to come home. Alan Mulholland was in that difficult position. He spent months anchored in the Caribbean and is now on his way back to the east coast of Canada, is hoping to get out before hurricane season arrives. I spoke with Alan just before he left on the weekend. Where are you right now?

ALAN MULHOLLAND: So right now, I'm in the port of Marin. It's on the south coast of Martinique. And Martinique is a French territory in the Caribbean.

MG: How did you end up in Martinique?

ALAN MULHOLLAND: I was actually on my way to Panama from the Canary Islands. It's a very big trip. And about 800 miles east of Martinique, I was hit by a rogue wave that picked my little 8-metre boat up and crashed it on its side, and received quite a bit of damage and broke or cracked a couple of ribs. So I decided to make a detour to Martinique to try to get the repairs done and get back on schedule.

MG: How long had you been at sea by the time this rogue wave hit?

ALAN MULHOLLAND: I was 31 days total between the Canary Islands and Martinique. And it was probably 10 days. So probably 21, 22 days into the passage, I was hit by that rogue wave.

MG: And this whole trip, it started when for you?

ALAN MULHOLLAND: It started last July. But really, it started about a year before that because I bought a boat that wasn't in very good condition and I spent a year getting it up to speed to make this Atlantic crossing. And this is really a dream, a personal challenge. And I've been loving it, I was loving it. It was going really well up until the boat was hit by that rogue wave and damaged.

MG: And so you end up in Martinique and you get yourself fixed up and the boat fixed up as well. When did you realize that this pandemic was starting to sweep around the world?

ALAN MULHOLLAND: I was talking to my wife almost every day, so I knew what was going on. And at first, I think like most folks, we thought it would be over fairly quickly. And I was really thankful that I was in such a nice place, you know, Martinique, and with great temperatures and great supports here. But at a certain point, the lockdown started happening and no boats could leave Martinique at all. They weren't allowed to travel to any of the other islands, because they all have their own jurisdictions. And we weren't even allowed to travel from the ports that we were currently in to more open anchorages because the gendarme wanted to contain, potentially, the virus. So I've been in the same spot, more or less now, for three-and-a-half months.

MG: Can you get onto the mainland and go into a town or something like that to to buy supplies? How does that work?

ALAN MULHOLLAND: We were allowed to do that. We had to have a written form with the date and the time that we would be going ashore. And it had to be filled out every single time you went ashore. But everything has changed this week now, things are starting to open up.

MG: And so what are your plans? You're there in paradise, I'm sure it's beautiful. You could ride this out, presumably. Why are you thinking that you need to t try to get back home?

ALAN MULHOLLAND: It is paradise for about six months of the year. But then in the other six months, more or less starting this month, the hurricanes start rolling through the Caribbean. And of course, you know how devastating they can be. There are probably more boats in this harbour than I have ever seen in any one place before. It's just crowded with boats, but all of them are standing into danger because this is well within the hurricane belt. So people are a little anxious about their investments because they want to head south to the hurricane-free zone, down by Trinidad and Tobago. But they're not allowed to make any plans yet because those islands aren't open. The other option was big freighters came here a few weeks ago for those who could afford it. They had their vessels lifted on the ships and sent home and then they were able to fly back to their countries of origin. And then the people like myself, we want to get our boats back to Canada to safety, and we have to wait until this time because the hurricanes are coming, yes, but the North Atlantic storms are still there. And there's a six-week window, statistically that is the safest time, and it starts right in the middle of May and goes to the end of June. And that's the time I'll be transiting back to Canada. There's no guarantee that there won't be heavy weather or storms or challenging conditions, but statistically, it's the safest period.

MG: Tell me about the trip. How long will it take for you to get home?

ALAN MULHOLLAND: It could take up to four weeks for me to get home. And that's because my boat is so small. I don't have an engine. I have a small outboard that I put on just in the last couple of miles to get into port. So if the wind doesn't blow, I'm really stuck in one spot. In a funny way, it's likely to happen as I transit the Bermuda Triangle, it's an area of variables where the wind gets very light. I could be stuck there, but not for any nefarious reason, more because the winds not blowing.

MG: What is the route? How do you get back home to P.E.I.?

ALAN MULHOLLAND: So once I leave Bermuda south of me and it's a straight run up to Nova Scotia. But that's also the difficult part of the trip. That last five or six hundred miles because we get those North Atlantic storms.

MG: That's four weeks, tricky trip home. You're by yourself. What do you think that's gonna be like?

ALAN MULHOLLAND: I'm really happy that this isn't the first passage that I'm making on this boat because it is challenging. And crossing the Atlantic, which sounds like an undertaking and it is, I don't want to make light of that in a small boat, but it's easier in many ways than this trip that I'm making north because of all the variables and the potential heavy seas sub near Canada. You know, I'll pull into the United States if I have to, but they don't want to. I will wait for an emergency, but the plan is to elevate the United States entirely and just make it straight to Canada.

MG: When you're out there in the middle of the ocean, what is it like?

ALAN MULHOLLAND: Oh, it's great. I really enjoy it. It's peaceful for the most part. It's a great time to reflect on life. And at the same time, there's a few moments of terror every now and then, as the wind starts screaming. I had crossed the Pacific 25 years ago, solo in a boat the same size as this. So I'm thinking I've had the incredible good fortune to be able to cross the Pacific solo and now to have crossed the Atlantic solo twice. This might be the end of my career when I get back to Canada, but I don't want to say that for sure.

MG: Your wife is back on P.E.I.?

ALAN MULHOLLAND: She's back in P.E.I. and she's very much looking forward to me getting home safely.

MG: We're in this unprecedented moment where the world in some ways has changed, and you've been out being bobbing in the ocean in Martinique, kind of unable to get home in some ways. What is it like to be removed from friends and family while all this is happening?

ALAN MULHOLLAND: You know, it is uncomfortable. But one of the things that happens and I don't wanna brag about this, but having a Canadian flag helps so much. We're so approachable as Canadians. It's not as though I've been totally away from friends and family, I've made new friends. It hasn't been as bad as I thought it would be.

MG: You couldn't have predicted this when you set out?

ALAN MULHOLLAND: Couldn't have predicted it. But of all the places to be stuck, the French territories here in the Caribbean are really well-run, and the essential services you know in the form of baguettes and cheese and wine are excellent.

MG: I wish you a safe trip home. You have an interesting time ahead of you, but certainly you'll have memories that you will never forget. Alan, safe travels.

ALAN MULHOLLAND: Thank you. It's been a real pleasure, Matt.

MG: Be well, take care. Bye bye.

ALAN MULHOLLAND: Bye.

MG: Alan Mulholland's is a Canadian sailor from P.E.I. on his way home after spending several months anchored in Martinique in the Caribbean.

The Vinyl Cafe: Odd Jobs

Guests: Stuart McLean

MG: This is The Current on CBC Radio One. My name is Matt Galloway. We played one that led to pleas for more. We obliged. And then you said, please, could we have one more? So once again, for your pleasure on this holiday Monday, here is the late great Stuart McLean and one of the Vinyl Cafe's most requested stories. This is Odd Jobs.

SOUNDCLIP

STUART MCLEAN: It was on a Saturday in September, but Dave and Morley sat eating breakfast and Morley looked at the toaster and said it would work so much better if we could plug it in at the table so we wouldn't have to get up and walk across the kitchen every time someone wanted toast. It was just a idle thought, but it struck her as a good one. So then she said maybe we should get someone in to move it. The next morning, Dave was sitting alone at the breakfast table, looking at the toaster on the other side of the kitchen, thinking I should move the plug myself. Morally was at work. They are opening a new play. The kids were still asleep. Dave had the whole day stretched out before him like a white line running down the centre of a highway. How complicated could it be for an old roadie? How complicated could it be for an old roadie to run some wires through a wall and install a plug? The more he thought about it, the more he liked the idea. And what he liked best of all was that he would get to knock holes in the kitchen wall. It felt good just thinking about that day fetched a hammer from the basement and then like a Spanish conquistadors, sealing the fate of his troops by burning his ship as soon as his last man stepped on shore. Dave raised the hammer over his head and swung it at the wall with all his might tiny. The hammer is sunk into the wall with a pleasing thump. A few more quick swings and Dave had a hole the size of a melon. He stood back and admired us. And then he wondered where the wires were going to come from. He thought maybe he should check his big Reader's Digest book of home repairs. You know, he could probably figure this out without the Reader's Digest help, but there could be no harm in checking. The book wasn't upstairs. It wasn't downstairs either. It wasn't anywhere. He wondered if Jim Schofield, his neighbour, had his repair book. He glanced at the kitchen clock. Jim was the kind of neighbour you visited rather than phoned. I don't have your book, said Jim, but I have a new mallet. I can't believe you started without me. Let me go get it. Jim and Dave stared at the hole where Dave wanted to put the new plug. But where's the wire coming from last year? That's what I was wondering. Jim pointed at a light switch by the back door. There'd be wire over there we could patch into, we said. And then he smiled. Of course, he said, we'll have to punch a hole in the wall and pick it up. Jim was fiddling with his new mallet. Be my guest said Dave. Are you sure, said Jim, moving towards the back wall, not waiting for an answer. There were wires there. In fact, when Jim stepped back and they both peeked in, his whole wires were about all he could see. All sorts of wires, black shiny wires, grey cloth, covered wires, Jim pointed at a grey wire, running through a porcelain insulator. Knob and tube, said Jim, I didn't think that stuff was legal anymore. Those aren't lives, said Dave. I had an electrician in to replace all at a couple of years ago. Dave reached into the hole with a screwdriver and jiggled the old wire. There was a sudden puff of smoke and day gasps in the right side of his body jerked spasticly and a deep alien like moan rolls out of him. And the screwdrivers flying across the kitchen end over end like a tomahawk ricocheting off the kitchen sink and disappearing through the window. There was a moment of stunned silence. Jim and Dave both staring at the broken window, shards of glass tinkling to the floor. Could you do that again? Says Jim. I like the way the ship of porcelain from the sink followed the screwdriver. A minute later, Bert Turlington, who lives next door, is ringing the front doorbell. Standing on the stoop with Dave's screwdriver in his hand. This yours? He asked. We're moving some wires, says Dave. I got a shock. You're moving wires, says Bert. I got one of those power drills for my birthday. Maybe I should bring it over. Something inexplicable happens when a man picks up a tool to do home repairs. Some force as yet undescribed by science, but nevertheless well-known to women. It's a force that lures men away from their families and the things they're supposed to be doing to a place where hammers are being swung. Maybe the act of a hammer moving through the air sets off a cosmic thrumming only men can hear. Or maybe when a man picks up a screwdriver, he releases an odour only men with tools can smell. It's a musty, yeasty, sweet sort of smell with a hint of leather and WD 40. And men in their back yards raking leaves and men in their basements, listening to ballgames on portable radios are seized by this odour only they can smell. It seizes on them, like the urge to migrate seises lesser species. And suddenly they're thinking, I don't belong here anymore. I belong in another place and I should be doing something else and I should take my coping saw with me just in case. Men consensus when a wall is coming down and they can't help the fact that they have to be there to watch it fall. Or better yet, help push it over. It's been argued that the fall of the Berlin Wall had nothing whatsoever to do with the collapse of communism. It was just a weekend project that got out of the way. Carl Lobeer was the next neighbour to arrive at Dave's house on Saturday we're talking about. He burst through the front door without knocking. Dave and Jim looked up and he's standing in the kitchen. Hi, said Carl, trying to slow himself down, trying to act nonchalant. Need any help? He's carrying a bright yellow thing about the size of an electric drill, except more dangerous looking. It looks like a cross between an Uzi and a woodpecker. It's his reciprocal saw. Carl got the saw last Christmas, it's his pride and joy, but there are only so many holes a man can cut in his own house before he is told to stop. At the end of August, when Carl's wife, Gerda, went downstairs with a load of laundry and found Carl cutting random holes in a sheet plywood she took the store away from him and later she said he could have it back if he stood in front of the house on Saturday mornings with a sign around his neck, need holes cut? By noon, there were seven men in Dave's kitchen. Two of them friends of Jim Schoefield, who Dave had never met before. Guys with tools. There were now a series of twelve melon size holes punched in the kitchen wall at 2 foot intervals, leading from the light switch by the back door to the hole where Dave intended to install a plug for the toaster. Twelve holes and seven busy men. Jim and Dave rotaring putty out of the broken window. Phil Harrison sucking up plaster dust with Carl Lobeer's Shop-Vac. The two men Dave didn't know, racing a pair of belt sanders along the floor. Six power tools operating at the same time, and Dave's house, Sam arrived downstairs, rubbing his eyes, taking in the chaos of his kitchen and asking asking the most reasonable question. What's for breakfast? Toast said Dave. He said this without turning the rotor off or even turning around. Sam stared at his father's back for a moment and then he shrugged and dropped a couple of slices of bread in the toaster. Then the lights went out and the tools died. And in the sudden and overwhelming silence, someone, Bert Turlington, I think, said, do you smell that? And then there was smoke hanging in the air like wisps of fog and someone said, we overloaded the wires, the wires are burning. Cut the wall open over here. And Carl Lobeer jumped up and said, my saw works on batteries. And he lurched toward the wall, rubbing his reciprocal saw in front of him, and before anyone could stop him, Carl had cut a hole in the wall the size of a loaf of bread. Not there, said Bert Turlington. Here. Coming, coming, said Carl. Cutting a second hole five feet down the wall, Sam's eyes as wide as saucers. I've got a fire extinguisher in the truck, said one of the men Dave didn't know. They found the remnants of the fire with the third hole most nest leaning against the overheated wires. It had burned itself out. The man with a fire extinguisher gave it a blast just in case. At 12:15, Dave took stock of what they had accomplished. The broken window, the chipped sink, 15 holes, the sodden plaster where they had used the extinguisher. Arnie Shellenberger looked at Dave and said, Dave, when's Morley coming home? Dave said not until tonight. Not until 10:00, 11:00. Arnie said, there's an electrician I know from the plant. He might come over. If you did the window, he could do the wiring and we could patch the holes by. He looked at his wrist 10. You need this done fast, right? Dave nodded. The electrician pointed to the back wall of Dave's kitchen. We're gonna pop out the drywall. We're gonna take that wall down to the studs. That way I can get it everything at once. Dave was looking worried. It'll be the fastest, said the electrician. He looked at Carl. Cut around the top of the ceiling and along the baseboard will pop it out nice and simple. Carl was beaming. Morley came home soon after nine. When she turned on to their street, she noticed her house looked strangely dark. She pulled into the driveway and parked the car and gathered an armful of junk. Her purse, a sweater, some files. She headed toward the back door. She was exhausted. She dropped a file and stooped to pick it up. And it was only then, only then that she noticed the warm glow of candles flickering through the back window, and she felt a wave of affection roll over her. Dave had made a romantic meal. She had barely eaten all day. She was smiling as she opened the back door. She put her purse down and called, Hello. And then she stopped dead in her tracks. Sometimes you're confronted by things that are so far from what you expect that there's a thought, there's a momentary disconnect. Your brain is unable to process what it is looking at. Morley looked around her kitchen. There were candles everywhere, and flashlights and snake lights and men. There were four men in her kitchen, all of them on their hands and knees. Four strangers on their hands and knees, staring at her the way a family of raccoons might stare at you from your backyard. As her eyes adjusted to the light, she was able to take in more details. The men were holding tools. There was a pile of pizza boxes on the floor and an empty case of beer. And Sam. Her son Sam sprawled out beside the pizza box, is asleep. Her son passed out. This was her kitchen. But two of the walls were missing. She looked at the man again. One of them stood up. Hi, I'm Ted, he said. The electrician. We'll have this cleared up in just a minute or two. And then she saw Dave, her husband, crawling towards her across what was left of her kitchen. He stopped about 10 feet away. Hi, he said. And then he waved his arm around the room at the broken window, at the 15 holes in the wall, at the back wall, which had completely disappeared and he said, we're fixing the toaster. Morley's mouth opened, but no words came out. It closed and then it opened again. She seemed to be trying to say something. Dave nodded. Trying to encourage her like they were like they were playing charades. Her mouth kept opening and closing, but no sound came out and then without saying anything, not one word Morley turned around and walked out of the house and got in her car and backed out of the driveway, and Dave said, it's OK. She'll be back in a minute. And Bert said, I think I should be going. And Carl said, me too. And Dave said, mate, maybe if we could just get the power on. Morley wasn't back in a minute. She wasn't back for nearly an hour. When she returned, she walked across the kitchen and opened the freezer door and about a cup of water trickled onto the floor and she let out a muffled sob. Dave helped her empty the freezer, and they deposited plastic bags of food in an assortment of neighbourhood fridges. They're all within easy walking distance, Dave pointed out helpfully. The renovation took six weeks to finish. Dave worked on it alone until the middle of the next week. Everything seemed to be working fine until Sam came home from school and showed them how he could turn the microwave on with a TV remote. So they called in an electrician to finish the job. A methodical and trustworthy man. It was the electrician who spotted the lead pipes running into the upstairs bathroom and he said, if you want to have them replaced, you might as well do it while you have the walls down. So they had the plumbers in and had the entire upstairs bathroom redone and downstairs where the back wall was, Morley had one of those bay windows put in, which is something she's always wanted. And she has a herb garden going in the window space. Dave was admiring the plants the other evening. Standing in the window and looking out into the yard, admiring the new view. It's a beautiful window and he likes it, especially in the morning when the light is soft. Last Saturday, Dave and Morley were sitting in the kitchen, drinking coffee and reading the paper. And the kids were still in bed and it was lovely to be there together. The sun drifting down on the coriander, Morley sipping her coffee and then standing up and walking over to the counter to make some toast. Don't you think it would work better if we could plug it in at the table, so we wouldn't have to get up and walk across the kitchen every time someone wanted to use the toaster.

MG: Stuart McLean and The Vinyl Cafe and Odd Jobs.

Closing with Tom Power

Guests: Tom Power

MG: This is The Current on CBC Radio One. I'm Matt Galloway. Q, of course, is back on your CBC Radio this morning. The host of Q is Mr. Tom Power. Hello, Tom.

TOM POWER: Matt, how great was that?

MG: I'm made very happy by hearing the voice of Stuart McLean. I miss him terribly and he cracks me up.

TOM POWER: Quite humbled too. I mean, I just I love how everyone was laughing and everyone was laughing and everyone was laughing and then he says, especially in the morning when the light was soft and it's just silence. Like the control over an audience, the empathy. It's unbelievable. It's so lovely to hear it. How are you doing? You doing good?

MG: Everything's okay. You had a nice weekend?

TOM POWER: Great weekend. Feeling good. Excited. I have to say, this is not just a plug. I woke up this morning. So excited to be back live on Q. It's been since the middle of March. Like March 18th or something. Right?

MG: We're glad to have you back. What do you have on the show quickly?

TOM POWER: Rick? I don't really know. No, I'm only joking. We were so excited about coming back, we didn't plan that out. No. Ricky Gervais, you might know from the The Office, the Golden Globes. His new show After Life, a bit of a sad one. Kind of beautiful.

MG: We'll listen for that. Tom, thank you.

TOM POWER: See you, Matt.

MG: Tom Power, the host of Q. He's next on CBC Radio One. I'm Matt Galloway. Thanks for listening to The Current. Take care and we'll talk to you tomorrow.

[Music: theme]

May 18, 2020 episode transcript

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