When I boarded a plane bound for Chicago in Rome earlier this week, I didn’t expect to make it back to the United States. My passport had stamps from travel through Germany, France, Ireland, England, and Italy over the last few weeks, countries from which travel is now banned to the United States.
On the departures board, over half of the flights out of the country were flashing “canceled” notices, including flights to India, England, Japan, Russia, and New York among others. As I waited to check in, other passengers sat on the windowsills in the terminal, on hold with airlines overwhelmed with calls from stranded travelers. But that wasn’t why I was worried I wouldn’t be allowed to board. I was still nursing a persistent cough and occasional fever from a bout of pneumonia earlier in the month (my doctor assured me that I was noncontagious and cleared to travel) and was sure that authorities would take one glance at my Italian long-term residence permesso, see the temperature reading on the thermal scanners, and notice my eyes water as I tried not to let a cough escape and send me back to lockdown in my Roman apartment.
One of the traits that has marked the American experience during this pandemic has been a lack of reliable information from a centralized source about the virus and government response as well as a plethora of misinformation spread anecdotally. Lack of clarity from the president about travel restrictions and right to entry into the U.S. beyond Friday for American citizens played into the huge crowds I witnessed at the airports I traversed on my way home, like the six-hour waits at O’Hare this weekend. Lack of clarity about preventative measures led to those same travelers donning face masks as we waited for our flights, leading to a national shortage of masks for those who need them most. Lack of clarity about the actual cost of coronavirus testing leaves everyone in the country reliant on rumors of bills upwards of $3,000 as a benchmark for testing cost and hesitant to avail of such a test, prompting additional undetected spread of the virus.
I boarded my plane in Rome without a single thermal scan, test, or question and did the same in Lisbon. When I deplaned a packed flight at O’Hare, the first question I received from officials was about whether I was bringing in any imported wine. “If only,” I joked while anxiously hoping they didn’t ask any questions about the foreign cheeses in my carry-on. The second was a question about what it was like being on lockdown in Italy. I told the lady at the immigration counter that my coworkers were taking advantage of the silent streets to snap pictures of the deserted St. Peter’s Square, Piazza Navona, and Colosseum without hordes of tourists in the background. She laughed. There seemed to be little concern that additional coronavirus cases may be entering the country on my flight. There wasn’t a single question about my health history, not a single thermal scan. There was not a single query about whether I’d traveled to northern Italy during the last few weeks, which has some of the highest infection rates in the world (I hadn’t, but my roommate had just traveled to Venice for Carnevale).
A few days later, the strange combination of nonchalance and heightening tension I saw in O’Hare airport was on display when my mom and I went to Sam’s Club to buy rice to prepare nonperishable dal chawal in case of a lockdown (after dark, as to increase ease of social distancing). I had only experienced a day of lockdown in Rome, but my roommates had kept me updated that long lines and hours-long waits to get basics as stores tried to enforce social distancing made trips to get groceries more difficult as each day of the lockdown progressed.
