I got a contract consulting for one of JP Morgan's software development groups in India, helping them with scalability issues, and flew to Hyderabad on December 3, 2019. It was my second contract with this group, and in the beginning, things went pretty much as expected. But then in January, we started hearing more about a new virus dangerous enough that governments were starting to take notice.
At first, we didn't think much of it. We started elbow bumping at the office sometimes instead of shaking hands, but it didn't feel like a real threat to us. Nobody in India had gotten the disease, and India historically had managed to avoid all the other major pandemics in Asia, like H1N1 and SARS, perhaps due to the hot and humid climate.
I even flew back to the US for a week-long seminar on February 15th, transiting through the Dubai airport, and enjoyed the business lounge without it even occurring to me that I should buy a mask. The CDC was still saying you shouldn't wear them, and although I saw many people wearing them in the airport, I actually wondered if perhaps it was just always like that in the Dubai airport.
At this point in February, Iran, perhaps the worst-hit country at the time, was still aggressively suppressing reports of their coronavirus cases. The Dubai airport was still running lots of flights to Iran, so not wearing a mask was really dangerous, but I wouldn't find that out until much later.
I flew back to Hyderabad through the Dubai airport again on February 22nd. At this point, there were only three confirmed cases in India, a country with a population of 1.4 billion, so it still didn't seem like a real and present danger. Those cases were a thousand miles away in the north. We continued elbow bumping and avoiding hugs, but when I came down with a runny nose, a sore throat, and a dry cough, I figured it was just jet lag and a run of the mill cold.
Then I started having trouble breathing.
It was like I had to breathe much deeper to get the same amount of oxygen. My girlfriend at the time she said she was having the same symptoms. There wasn't anything we could really do though, tests weren't widely available yet anyway. We figured if it got worse we'd go to the hospital, but in the meantime, we'd just try to get to sleep.
As we got better, everything else got worse. The buildings on either side of my office had a confirmed case and everyone was ordered to evacuate. JP Morgan ordered everyone to start working from home, or from your hotel room in the case of the American consultants in Hyderabad. The hotel started to feel more and more empty as new guests stopped checking in and old guests kept checking out. They started telling more and more staff not to come to work. The movie theater closed, then the gym, then the restaurants.
The company started pressuring me to fly home to the US, but by this point, in March, the US had become the new epicenter of the pandemic. India definitely seemed like a dangerous place to be, but the US seemed like it could be even worse. At least in India, there were relatively few cases, and the government was taking it seriously.
I started researching other countries to flee to. The countries that seemed to be handling it well were the four tigers: Hong Kong, Taiwan, and South Korea. I decided Singapore was my best bet. They speak English, it's close to India, and I'd been there before so I knew I'd be able to get around okay.
But then Singapore closed its borders to all foreigners. Worse, they closed their airports to transit flights, which meant the largest hub in the region was no longer allowing layovers, effectively cutting off most of the flight routes to other safe havens. Then the Indian government canceled most international flights.
Trying to avoid layovers in Dubai, I booked a new flight on March 22, this time through Tokyo to Seoul. The flight was scheduled to depart two days later on March 24. That night, the Janta Curfew went into effect. No one was allowed out during the day and I worried about being stopped on the way to the airport. There were only a couple of guests left in the hotel and a skeleton crew of staff.
The next day, Prime Minister Nahendra Modi announced that all airports would be closed at midnight the next day, effectively canceling my flight. It was the middle of the night but I immediately packed my backpack, throwing out anything that wouldn't fit in my carry-on. There were no Ubers but the two remaining staff members at the hotel were able to find a taxi for me. I headed to the airport and got on the first flight I could to Delhi.
When I got to Delhi, everything was empty. There were no taxis, no buses, no people, it was like a ghost town. I tried every airline ticket counter asking for a flight out, but to no avail, all their flights were canceled. I tried to get a taxi to a hotel, but there were no taxis. There were no buses either, or people for that matter.
I called the US embassy, and they said they told me there was nothing they could do to help. They said they'd add my name to the list of Americans stranded in India, but that at the moment the advice was to try to get out on commercial flights. They gave me the name of one of the few remaining hotels still accepting foreigners, and I made a reservation at the Marriott.
Thankfully, they were able to arrange a car to pick me up. Otherwise, I would've had to walk and risk getting stopped by the local police, or worse, the federal police that had been sent in to enforce the curfew. There were barricades everywhere, almost no cars on the road, and lots of police.
When I got to the hotel, they actually had extra masks, so for the first time since the pandemic started, I was able to actually wear one. The pharmacies in Hyderabad had all been sold out. The staff asked me if I was with the German embassy. I wasn't of course, but apparently, I'd happened upon the meeting point for an evacuation flight organized by the German government. Elated, I went about trying to get on the list.
They told me the flight was for Germans first, EU citizens second, UK citizens third, and everyone else whose embassies had arranged a deal with the German government. The first German official I spoke to was actively hostile and told me to talk to the American embassy. "I don't understand why your country can't get organized," she said, telling me if I wasn't happy, I should vote.
I told her I voted against the current administration in 2016 and would do so again in 2020 but would only be able to do so if I could get back to my country. She was having none of it.
I found another German official who was a little friendlier and told me I could plead my case if I showed up the next morning at 9am. I decided to try my luck and got on the bus the next morning headed to the German embassy, avoiding the angry German woman from before.
They checked our passports as we lined up to board the buses and I was almost turned away, but eventually, they let me on. We waited for hours on that bus, first waiting at various hotels to load up more German and EU tourists, then waiting at various checkpoints to show embassy credentials privileging us to travel during the Janta Curfew, then finally waiting outside the German Embassy as the buses ahead of us were unloaded.
Hundreds and hundreds of people got out. Businesspeople, hippies, backpackers, children, elderly, students, monks. They queued in front of the gates to have their documents checked, their temperatures taken, and their hands sanitized.
When our bus was unloaded, I waited in line in the hot Indian sun with all my belongings strapped to my back, hoping to be allowed inside. Without an EU passport though, I was sent to wait in a makeshift camp outside the embassy walls, below the barbed wire. Indian federal police patrolled the street with their assault rifles, monitoring the growing crowd of foreigners which the local news was reporting on increasingly anxiously.
Those of us without papers traded rumors. Someone said some Germans would be denied exit visas on the grounds that they'd overstayed and not paid their fines, which might open up seats on the plane for refugees. Apparently, there were 800 seats and they were all expected to fill. Someone said another flight would leave the following day as well, depending on demand.
A Hare Krishna from Ukraine with an expired German residency card started a drum circle and we all came together to chant while embassy employees passed out water bottles. We shared food and WhatsApp numbers and hopes of a flight out. Periodically embassy employees would come by to read out names of people who had made the list. I stole away for conference calls, still working remotely and trying to avoid revealing that I was essentially in a makeshift refugee camp.
Night fell, and the embassy announced that the plane was full. The Marriot had apparently closed, and I was shuttled with the remaining refugees to a Westin nearby. We were told to try again in the morning as a second flight had been confirmed.
The hotel had a list of people from the German Embassy who were allowed to check in though, and many of us were not on it. Worse, the angry German woman who had yelled at me the day before was in charge of the list. The Ukrainian Hare Krishna who'd started the drum circle spoke German and also was not on the list, so he approached her on my behalf. She turned us both away, and I asked a group of Britishers from the drum circle who'd made the list if we could stay with them. They told us no, saying they didn't want to break the Germans' rules and jeopardize their chances at a flight out.
Eventually, I was able to convince the staff to rent me a room for double the price. The Hare Krishna couldn't afford it and resolved to camp outside the hotel. I told him he should stay in my room instead. We woke up early the next morning to wait in various lines, checking various papers against various lists.
When we got to the German Embassy, they'd set up some tents for those of us without the proper documents, so we at least had a little shade. The crowd was smaller this time, and the rumors more hopeful. Apparently, the flight was nowhere near full and the Germans were going to lose a lot of money on the flight without more passengers. The crowd dwindled as the bureaucrats rationalized more and more exceptions to the rules. I called friend and family members looking for any shred of evidence I could find that showed any kind of connection to Germany or the EU that could be used to support my case.
Finally, as the sun set, a French Embassy worker told me that their legal expert on EU evacuation decrees had determined that it would be illegal to let me on the plane. The angry German woman from before came out to shout at me again to leave. But there was nowhere for me to go. There was no transportation back to the hotel this time, and there were police patrols everywhere with assault rifles enforcing the Janta Curfew. I considered trying to walk to the US Embassy which I could've reached on foot in only ten or fifteen minutes, but whenever I stepped into the street the police shouted at me not to leave Embassy grounds.
The Germans were worried I'd try to stow away on one of the evacuation buses headed to the airport and sneak onto their flight and sent someone to monitor me from a distance while they loaded up. My laptop was dead and my cell phone was at 6% battery when finally I got through to someone at the US Embassy. They arranged for a car to take me back to the Westin.
Back at the hotel, I started chatting everyone up about evacuation flights. I asked every group of foreigners I saw if they had a way out. There weren't many foreigners but they were all talking about the same thing: how to get out. The Italians had a flight chartered to Rome, but the Italian outbreak was so bad that there were no flights out once you got there, and the flight was fully booked anyway.
Days went by and finally the US Embassy announced plans to charter flights out. It was extremely disorganized though, and better information was available on the Americans Stranded In India groups on Facebook and WhatsApp, where I became a regular.
One day, I came across a couple of Americans who had just moved to New Delhi and were staying in the hotel while their apartment was being renovated. They were talking about the crowd of migrant workers who could be seen walking on foot on the highway heading back hundreds of miles to the east as public transit had been closed and they had nowhere to stay.
We chatted briefly and they mentioned they worked in the US Embassy. From them, I learned that a flight had been chartered by a religious group in the US, and extra seats were being given to priority citizens like those who were immunocompromised or in other high risk groups. I shared the news on WhatsApp, and soon we heard of a couple people who'd been picked. Flights were four times the cost of those the Germans had organized though, and some people couldn't afford them. There'd been a lot of price gouging on flights and a lot of tourists in India were on a shoestring budget. The scary thing about the US flight was that they said it could cost more than $2,000 and you had to agree to pay it without knowing the final price, which had a lot of people angry.
Then one American girl started posting about a Japanese flight she claimed was still flying. Most people didn't take it seriously since there were lots of flights you could still buy tickets on. They would just get canceled though and then you'd be left to fight for a refund, and their customer support lines were always slammed. It was unclear whether this was intentional scamming or just incompetence on the part of the airlines, but many people had been burned.
Then she posted a photo from the airport, and then from the gate, and then from inside the airplane. The same airline was running that route one more time that week, on March 30th. Minutes later, the flight was sold out. I got a ticket just in time.
Next, I set about applying for a Janta Curfew travel pass to get to the airport. The state of New Delhi had started issuing them online. I submitted my application and waited. Apparently, they were backed up, and the website was unable to handle the load.
A Finnish woman in the hotel sent me a link to an evacuation flight to Helsinki that left two days after the flight to Tokyo which had just been opened to non-Fins. I bought a ticket for that flight too, just in case the Japanese flight was canceled or I was denied entry.
On March 30th, I packed up to head to the airport and discovered my travel pass application had been denied. I pulled together whatever documents I could muster to justify my travel, including a very flimsy claim that my work as a software developer was somehow "essential" to the fight against COVID-19. The hotel was able to arrange a car, and somehow we made it to the airport without getting stopped at a checkpoint. I headed to the check-in counter.
"Americans are no longer allowed visa-free travel into Japan due to the pandemic," the woman at the counter said, "and you don't have a visa."
"I'm not going to Japan," I countered, "it's just a layover, I've got onward passage to South Korea," showing her another ticket on my phone.
"Americans aren't allowed into South Korea without a visa unless they can show onward passage," she replied.
"I have onward passage from South Korea as well," I said, "I have a flight back to Japan in June."
"But you're not allowed into Japan," she responded, skeptically.
"I will be by June," I stated with an entirely feigned sense of confidence.
"Okay, you can board, but we take no responsibility if you are denied entry when you arrive," she said.
And with that, I headed to the gate. Thank goodness I'd done so much visa research and bought those extra tickets. Perhaps I would be blocked at immigration in Japan, but as long as they didn't send me back to India I would at least have a shot at getting on a flight to a safe country from there.
It was a brutal redeye, and I was exhausted when we touched down in Tokyo. We deboarded the plane, and I went to find the gate for my connecting flight to Seoul. I had a 12-hour layover so there was plenty of time to nap, I thought.
I couldn't find my flight on any of the departure boards though. It seemed that something like 9 out of 10 flights on the board were marked as canceled, but mine wasn't listed at all. Dismayed but hopeful, I sought out an airport employee who could help. They were running a skeleton crew, but eventually I found one who spoke English.
"This flight leaves from Haneda airport on the other side of Tokyo," he said, "this is Narita airport."
"Is there an airport shuttle?" I asked, a little panicky.
"Yes, but you'll need to leave the airport to get it," he replied.
This was not good. I did not have a visa for Japan. He pointed me to Immigration and I headed over, disheveled, sweaty, and tired.
"Are you American?", the immigration officer asked.
"Yes," I answered.
"You think coronavirus does not apply to you?" she asked, her eyes narrowing.
"I wear a mask all the time," I said, pointing to the surgical mask I'd been wearing since finding out about that first German evacuation flight. "I wash my hands frequently," I added, miming hand-washing, "and I stay 6 feet apart," taking another step back.
"Why do you come to Japan?" she probed.
"I don't come to Japan," I said, "I go to South Korea, this is just a layover." I held up my ticket to Seoul, and with that, she stamped my passport.
Exhausted and with so many hours left until my flight, I set out in search of a hotel. Much like in Delhi, there were no taxis. I headed on foot to the nearest hotel on the map. Fifteen or twenty minutes later, I walked up to the check-in counter for a familiar experience.
"You can't stay here," the woman at the counter said matter-of-factly. "We're not taking new guests."
"Where can I get a room then?" I asked.
"You just landed?"
"Yes."
"I don't know."
And with that, I walked off to the next hotel, and the next, to be turned away again. Finally, I found one which promised me I could check in if I waited 4 hours. That would only afford me a 2-hour nap before I needed to head back to the airport, but I didn't have anywhere else to go. I paid and then curled up in a stairwell and tried to sleep with my backpack as a pillow until the room opened up. It was too cold in the hallway though, and eventually, I gave up.
I finally was allowed into a room and was able to shower and change before heading back to the airport. There were two other Americans on the flight, both there on visa runs. Apparently, you can stay in Korea for 90 days at a time as a tourist, and many people fly to Japan and back to reset their 90-day limit periodically.
According to one of them, a new rule was going into effect at midnight. Foreigners would have to pay $100 a day to stay in government-designated quarantine facilities instead of self-quarantining wherever you like. Our flight would be landing at 11:30pm.
Just then, I got a message from the Marriott where I'd booked a room. My reservation was being canceled because of the new rule. The hotel said there was no way I'd make it before the deadline.
If only I could get through immigration before midnight. Unfortunately, I was seated in the very back of the plane. Once we boarded and the flight took off, I got up and asked one of the stewardesses if I could change seats so that I could deboard sooner.
"This flight is entirely sold out, so there are no open seats for you to switch to, but we are ahead of schedule and may land at 11pm," she replied.
Hopeful, I returned to my seat and waited, backpack strapped on and ready to hustle as soon as we landed in Seoul. When I finally got off the plane, I sprinted the whole way across the airport to immigration and made it near the front of the line.
"Passport," the security officer said, and I reached into my pocket, only to feel it was empty.
Fuck, I thought, panicking. Where was my passport? They checked it when I boarded the flight in Tokyo so I had it when I got on the plane. Maybe I left it on the plane?
I sprinted the whole way back across the airport to the gate, frantic, only to be stopped by security.
"I left my passport on the plane!" I panted breathlessly.
I sprinted the whole way back across the airport to the gate, frantic, only to be stopped by security.
"I left my passport on the plane!" I panted breathlessly.
Two stewardesses took pity on me and one agreed to go check. A painful five minutes later, she returned smiling and handed me my passport.
"Thank you so much!" I shouted, already sprinting back to security, it was 11:45pm now.
They checked my documents, had me download a government COVID-19 tracking app, and asked where I was staying. I gave them the address of my hotel.
"Do you have their phone number?" the quarantine officer asked.
"Do you have their phone number?" the quarantine officer asked.
"No," I said, worried the hotel would refuse to accept me.
The quarantine officer just searched for the hotel online and got their number. My hopes of self-quarantining in comfort were dashed. But then, to my surprise, the officer smiled and waved me on.
"Check in on this app every day," he said, and I agreed.
From there, I was just allowed to go. No special sanitized buses like I'd seen on the news, no transportation at all actually. I got to the exit and there was but a single taxi.
"I'm the only taxi driver here, and there are no buses," the man said.
I didn't have much of a choice, so I agreed to the $150 cab fare to my hotel.
When I arrived, I went to the front desk to check in.
"Are you William Jeffries?" the woman at the counter asked.
"Yes, here is my reservation," I replied.
"We tried to get in touch with you, you can't stay here. We've booked you at a government quarantine facility, here's a map for how to get there," she said.
I looked at the paper she gave me. It was a booking for another hotel with worse reviews.
"Are there any other hotels where I can stay?" I asked.
"The government office that assigns quarantine facilities is closed, and this is the only one they gave us," she answered.
Exhausted, I headed out again to the quarantine facility on the map. When I arrived, everything was covered in anti-viral tape. They checked my temperature and gave me a bag full of masks, disinfectant, a thermometer, and other quarantine goodies as I checked in for my 14-day quarantine.
"How long will you be staying with us?" the man at the counter asked.
"Do I have a choice?"
"No."
This strange mixture of hospitality and strict bureaucratic procedure would characterize the rest of my stay at the quarantine facility. I can't complain though, they were very professional and their strict adherence to protocol I'm sure kept people safe. And if they hadn't taken me, I would've likely been shipped back to New York City, which was becoming the worst-hit city in the world.
So that's the story of my escape from India. It's about here where my blog picked up. If you'd like to keep reading, you can go back to my first blog entry, here:
That's about all I have to document for posterity. My life since then has become increasingly mundane and not worthy of the effort I put into blogging. I've just been slowly adjusting to the Korean version of this new world we live in. It still seems far preferable to the panic, disorder, and periodic lockdowns in the US.
Here the government has control over the pandemic, hospitals have lots of capacity, everyone listens to medical experts, there is no shortage of PPE, everyone can buy N95 masks, you can safely go to restaurants, and new cases are basically stable at well under 100 per day for a population of 50 million, making it one of the best countries in the world for COVID-19.
Much as I would like to see my family, flying internationally would needlessly put others at risk. It seems I should continue this responsible but boring wait-and-see approach. If things get interesting enough to warrant restarting this blog, I will, but for now, let's hope it doesn't.
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