How long is covid this time? | Catalonia

Terror returns. The fears. The anguish of contagion. Ready to write the news before the holidays begin, I see myself, like a year ago, locked in a room, begging someone to leave me a couple of Prince biscuits with a glass of milk on the doorstep. There is no way. As I scream, sniffle and cough, all my muscles ache, especially my right leg. And a novelty compared to last year – an unbearable and sharp toothache. This week in Catalonia, the outpatient clinics treated more than 6,100 people for covid and 930 are already hospitalized. The Generalitat will maintain automatic cancellations due to the coronavirus until January 31, despite the opposition of employers.

It’s the second time I’ve had covid, always at Christmas, it would be more! They say it is now common constipation. I do not agree. And that you can lead a normal life. I disagree again. Several signs indicated to me in the previous days that I was getting close to the cursed virus. Memories of last Christmas locked up with all the large infected family, a recent contact with a positive, a lot of contact and, of course, the taxi driver. The day before the line suddenly appeared in my test, a driver from Barcelona told me that he got married in June and he, his wife and their little son, as well as 50 of the 90 guests, were infected. I got out of the car in shock. And then came the confirmation. I call 061 and they tell me that if there are no respiratory problems it is better to stay at home. The hospital emergencies are full again and the doctors are up to the nose. I call my last contact, overwhelmed by the thought that I have infected none other than a cousin. Plus, living in a family of five leads you to toxic comparisons: Who is suffering the most from the virus? who hurts more? I even had to listen to how I was accused of pulling a false negative out of my sleeve to kick one of the patients out of bed and do myself. It’s true that I took the test shot quickly, before any streaks appeared. How long does this new covid last? I hope four days.

But this chronicle has another goal. And to that we go. It tells the story of the Gràcia piano. The instrument was installed during the Maria Canals music competition, in the concourse of the Gràcia de la Generalitat railway station, through which 14,000 passengers pass daily. The organization decided at the end of the competition to leave the piano there given the success achieved. And for now, it remains fixed. Anyone can touch it. And so it happens. Jeroni Oliva, head of production and projects of Maria Canals, plays the piano wonderfully and takes care of that of Gràcia. He speaks with passion. “It’s a good way to promote music and also demystify that elite piano thing. Anyone can touch it, even if they’re trying to. And elitist to some extent. We have a project called Em toca, with children from social exclusion neighborhoods, and other projects like pianos on the patio. For example, in Nou Barris we place the tool outside the station to bring it much closer to people with the help of the facilitator. Obviously it is worth buying a piano, but now there are many solutions”. The Gràcia piano is played by many people throughout the day. And if they beat him, well, nothing happens, says Jeroni: “We want them to break, not the piano, but the barrier.” The tuner often comes to tune it. They decided to chain the stool to the piano. To avoid unpleasant surprises.

It’s 23 hours. Laura returns home. When she crosses the station concourse she sees a boy playing. Send a photo. She is a passenger of Ferrocarrils. Many times you have been tempted to play a silly note, but you don’t. She prefers to observe. The first time she saw Gràcia’s piano, she thought it was “a useless pose. They put a piano in a station with lots of people passing by, in a hurry, a space that doesn’t invite you to stop, let alone play the piano”, admits Laura, director of communication for a Barcelona institution. “It was my idea that was contradicted by what actually happened: every time it happened there were people and practically at all hours”. Laura has detected patterns. In the morning, always the same man with headphones that he started practicing, that is, that he stamped the ticket to enter the station and play. Over time, moreover, people have followed one another. He is almost always busy: “This led me to think about the power of public space design. If we think of urban planning in another way, it could affect the way we relate to each other and how we avoid public space, which we only use to get from home to work”.

PS If you have covid, a recommendation from a friend: Netflix helps you decorate your confinement with Fireplace for your homea video in 4k Ultra HD quality showing the crackling of a real fireplace.

If you don’t have covid, go see the Raluy Circus, in Barcelona’s Moll de la Fusta. To keep believing in the magic of the circus. And she goes to Gràcia … to play the piano.

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