Coronavirus

What a quandary! We are a little obsessed with coronavirus and are monitoring the situation very carefully to ensure we keep updated.

We are staying in south east India, in a place called Pondicherry (Puducherry), which is in the state of Tamil Nadu. There is now three reported cases in Tamil Nadu, which seems pretty good with a population of 77 million people! They have been very proactive in response to COVID-19, and public places, schools etc have been closed for a while, with a focus on prevention rather than management. State and national borders are either closed or have significant restrictions. The whole country has responded quickly. If we had arrived in India a week later than we did, we wouldn't have been allowed in as visas have been suspended until 15 April. Because we are already here, we can stay. International borders are also closed from 22 March for a week. 

Thankfully, we are all healthy and we feel safe from the virus. Our plans have changed a little for now though. We made the decision to stay in Pondicherry for at least a couple of weeks rather than moving on. Pondi is a lovely little French/Indian village complete with French bakeries and booze. Not such a bad place to chill. We were to be in Kerala now, a state to the south west, but virus numbers are higher due to it being a popular expat and tourist spot, so we'll wait and see.

The issue for us at the moment is not one of safety from the virus (we feel very safe where we are), but whether we could get home if needed. The Australian Government recommendation on smartraveller.gov.au reads: 'As more countries close their borders and introduce travel restrictions, overseas travel is becoming more complex and difficult. You may not be able to return to Australia when planned to'. However we feel that we are in a fortunate position of not needing to rush back. We have 9 months until we have to be home, so fingers crossed the situation gets better and not worse. We have changed our India itinerary, and are no longer going to some places. There is also the option to stay in India longer than our original two months. Who know, we might not even get to Europe!

Everything has exploded in such a short time, only really in the last month, so we are hopeful that things will improve in the next couple of months. We will keep monitoring.

We also emailed DFAT to explain our situation and ask for some feedback, so we'll see what they come back with.

Stay safe everyone!