Blog Post May 2020 by Wendy Dobing

Posted on May 31, 2020 at 05.31PM

 Lockdown London

I decided to investigate (at a social distance!) the impact of lockdown on people in London, just before the lockdown changes to 'Phase 2' allowing people more freedom.

The streets were understandably quieter than normal, fewer people out and about. People want to live their lives as normal as possible: getting their shopping, texting their friends, socially distancing. Not everyone accepts the lockdown rules though - cordon ribbon is removed so people can sit down to rest. In principle the idea works, deterring the idea of sitting but people just don't like being told what to do!

There is a sense of sadness and anxiety - there is no confidence to live life as we did before and everything is closed. The nation's favourite activities of eating out and shopping have now been replaced by walking aimlessly yet politely just to get out and shopping for essential food. The panic buying eventually died down but that was enough to cause extreme anxiety for many. Focus has now turned to mask wearing and an the industry of bespoke mask tailoring! I've seen adverts on social media and even adverts on people's driveway entrances extolling someone's mask making services.

At least the sun has been shining almost non stop during the whole lockdown phase. The sunshine promotes a positive outlook, unfortunately it also promotes sun bathing and other anti lockdown behaviour!