Someone asked about our vaccination experience and I replied as follows:
Up at 5. In line at 6:45. Line started moving at about 11. Line moves and stops as people are processed in groups of 200. We get our shot late in the day. Then a mandatory 30 minute wait. Then registration for the second dose. Home just before 8 pm. Hard to imagine anything more inefficient. But I was very impressed by how very few people were triggered by all this, mostly amazing calm.
Pat, who is a much better writer than I am, wrote the following description which she sent to her sister and a couple of friends.
I thought I would tell you a story. I just have to get it off my chest.
John and I went to a superspreader event in Ajijic yesterday - the giving out of the Covid vaccine.
We registered for the vaccine a few weeks ago and were told what documents to prepare for the day we receive our vaccinations. We didn't expect anything to happen for months but, to our great surprise, we received notification on Monday that they were going to be giving out the Sinovac vaccine on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday in Chapala and Ajijic. We were happy to find out that the location for the Ajijic one was on the malecon, within walking distance for us.
We decided to go on Wednesday to give the organizers the first day to work out the kinks. The vaccinations were slated to start at 8:00. We arrived at the malecon at 6:45 a.m. There were about 500 people already in line ahead of us. Because of the large number of people, there was no social distancing. Thankfully, about 99% of the people were wearing masks. Some people brought chairs but we didn't want to carry them. It was basically OK as we were able to perch on the malecon. People kept coming after we arrived and the line grew substantially longer. We sat in our original spot for over 4 hours, not moving forward, until about 11:00. Like the day before, the vaccine didn't arrive until about 10:30. It was brought in by the military with a contingent of soldiers guarding the shipment in their Ninja outfits and uzis. I guess vaccine shipments are targets for the cartels.
Shortly after we arrived and took our place in line, some officials came to check our documents to make sure we had everything we needed. We realized later that these people didn't seem to know what we needed.
Priority was given to about 100 people from the day before who waited and did not receive their vaccine because the last few batches were rendered useless because they got too warm. After the initial long wait, we were able to advance a good distance ahead and then had to sit and wait again. Handicapped people were shuttled to the front of the line in periodic bursts, which was understandable. During this second long wait, some more officials came to check our documents again. We had arrived at the same time as some neighbours from our street so we at least had someone to talk to while we waited. Both our neighbours and we did not have the right document for one of the requirements so the wife and John went to a purple building where they had computers set up and were printing out the correct documents for people. So, back in line, and wait some more. By this time, it was around 2:00. John and I marvelled at how calm most of the crowd was. I was too - for the first 7 hours. Every now and then, we would shuffle forward toward the tents that were set up ahead. Thankfully for us, because of our place in line and the timing of when we arrived, we were in the shade most of the time, but not everyone was so lucky. I brought a book to read but couldn't focus. John listened to several podcasts but after awhile, he had enough of them. A few hours later, we shuffled forward again and were now seated in the first tent. By this time, the natives were getting restless. One official kept coming around and saying, "media hora" - half an hour. He did this every half hour, jokingly, but it was starting to get old. Oh, time to get up and move! Great! Finally! I had to laugh when they moved us from our rows at the back of the tent to the front. So we did a few iterations of musical chairs. Some more officials came around to where we were seated and checked our documents. Again! Some of the officials were starting to get bossy, moving people from one area to another, or telling people to get out of the chairs and move over there, where there was shade. Tempers were starting to get short. By this time, John was watching people and studying the psychological aspects of the situation and marvelling that there wasn't an out and out riot. Our neighbour said this is getting really hard for her to maintain her composure and she was reading Ekhart Tolle to maintain some semblance of calm.
I do have to give some props at this time to some of locals who were coming around with free water and cut up oranges. There were others selling sandwiches and soft drinks and trying to make this whole ordeal somewhat more bearable for us.
However, during this whole time, no one came around to take our temperatures. There was no spraying of disinfectant or squirts of sanitizing gel or anything. I was thinking how ironic it would be if, after a year of strict precautions that we had taken, we came down with Covid because we had gone to a Covid vaccine event.
By this time, I really needed to go to the bathroom, so since we were just sitting around, I got up and left our roped off area to one of the buildings that had bathrooms. Ewwwwww!!!! The first building had water all over the floor, but no water to flush and none to wash hands. Luckily I had toilet paper with me. So I walked over to another building, washed my hands and walked back to the taped off area to get to where we were seated. I ducked underneath the tape behind a couple of teenage Mexican girls and was walking back to my seat when I heard shouting behind me but I kept on walking until I felt someone grab my arm and there was a policeman demanding that I show him my ID, and trying to steer me back to the tape. Well - that triggered me. I had left my documents with John because I didn't want to take them with me to the bathroom. I pointed to where I was sitting and said in broken Spanish that my husband had them. He demanded my ID again, harshly, and by this time another cop was there. I was saying, NO, and then one of the female organizers came up to me and in English told me that I was not allowed to leave this area. I told her that I had to go to the bathroom. But, yes, madam, you should have let them know that you were leaving. I was thinking, HOW DARE YOU! This whole event is a freaking shitshow and completely disorganized, and you are coming after me because you want to see my ID! Why don't you do something useful and get these lines moving! Why don't you get someone to clean the bathrooms and restock them with toilet paper? And, if it is so important that I don't leave this area, why didn't you stop me as I was leaving? Where were you then? You were shirking your duty! (This was the conversation in my head.) This whole time there were kids running around everywhere and people walking all over the place. And I notice he didn't stop the two teenage girls who had slipped in just ahead of me. I was furious. They turned away from me and I marched back to my seat and fumed for the rest of the next few hours.
Well, we shuffled forward from the first tent to the second tent and I saw needles! We were getting close to the end! After listening to announcements confirming that we were getting the Sinovac vaccine, and being told the first shot had a 65% efficacy and the second a 95% efficacy, being warned not to mix our vaccines, that the second shot should be the same brand as the first, which pills and medications were OK to continue taking and which were not, and being cautioned not to drink any alcohol for 20 days, we finally received our jab. We were then told we had to stay there for 30 minutes to be sure that we were not going to have an adverse reaction to the vaccine, after which we got into another line and told to go to the final area where they would collect our documents and register us for the follow-up vaccine.
The final step! There were two tables set up, with people sitting behind them and not a computer in sight. More papers. They took our documents and filled out new forms asking us the same questions that were on already on our documents when we started this whole process and laboriously filled out the second set of forms. Our neighbours were not too impressed when their girl took about 4 or 5 personal calls during this time.
Finally, we were done. The whole process from the time we arrived to the time we got our 5 second jab and filled out the final paperwork took 12 hours and 45 minutes! It was 7:30 p.m. and dark. As we were leaving, a woman tried to stop us and told us that we needed to go to the tables and do the final paperwork, at which time we informed her that we had just done that and were finished. Oh, OK. Confusion. Her mistake.
There were people that had been waiting for 10 hours that were finally told that there was no more vaccine and to come back tomorrow when they would be given first priority.
If there was a worse way to have handled this fiasco, I don't know what it was. How inconsiderate to have subjected us old people, most of them in far worse shape than John and I, to hours of waiting, only to be told to come back tomorrow. They know how many vaccines they are going to be giving out. How hard is it to count the people in line and cut it off at a certain point and tell the rest to go home instead of subjecting them to hours of waiting.
We heard later that the Chapala event was much more organized, turning their people around in 2 - 3 hours. As well, vaccinations in Jocotopec and Guadalajara apparently went much more quickly. And all of these were run by Mexicans, so it can be done. There was something drastically wrong with the way it was handled in Ajijic. I think we picked the absolute worst day. We also heard today that the line in Ajijic was much shorter. I wonder how many people just decided not to come because they were so turned off by the previous 2 days.
So...yay...we get to do this again in 28 days.
John, who usually gets triggered more than I do, was amazingly calm. I was exhausted when we got home. What a complete waste of a day! It was too late for supper, so I decided to go on the chat board and see what people were saying about the day's debacle. Well, people may have remained outwardly calm at the event, but they let loose on the FB groups and slammed the organizers, outraged at the insensitive treatment of the elderly. Of course, there were the usual comments by the "If you don't like it, go back where you came from. This is Mexico." do-gooders, but the majority were outraged. I am sure the organizers and the government will get a lot of feedback.
Sorry for this, but I had to vent. Today was a good day. It was normal and peace reigned supreme! No aftereffects - YET!
I will now add a few more of my own comments.
I listened to about three hours of podcasts which were all very good and the time passed quickly. But I reached a point where I was full, not able to absorb any more information. Then time moved much more slowly.
Sitting next to neighbors was a pleasant experience and I enjoyed our snippets of conversation. The husband has a naturally very calm temperament. He said he has always been this way, born this way. He was as calm at the end of the day as at the start. The wife was more like me, having worked at growth and development over many years.
I immediately felt Pat's mood change when she returned from her annoying trip to the bathroom. Often we feed off each other when we spiral downward emotionally but not on this day. Psychologically I was having an above average day but I am not sure why. Perhaps, maybe, with all the work I am doing on myself I am making some progress. Or maybe it was just a random mood swing in the right direction.
But at the end of the day I was triggered. Just as we were finally leaving I was stopped. The staff member mistakenly thought that I had not registered for my second dose. Suddenly I felt intense irritation. Then the walk to our neighbours car went slowly because she stopped to chat with someone a couple of times. More irritation. I just wanted to get home.
And when I got home I was pleasantly surprised at how quickly I relaxed. I had a bite to eat and a shower and watched some TV. That was followed by a good night of sleep.