Vaughan Gunson: Be kind to Auckland visitors this festive season - and wear your mask

Wear your mask and be kind to Aucklanders when they come north this Christmas, Advocate columnist Vaughan Gunson says.

The lead-up to Christmas can be stressful at the best of times. Everything gets busy.

There seems to be so much to do at work and at home.

For many Northlanders, there will be extra anxiety around Christmas because of that date, December 15, when travel around the country will resume.

It's later than some would have liked. It's coming too soon for others.

From a health perspective, with Covid vaccination rates in Northland still some way off 90 per cent, it feels like we're being rushed. A little more time would have been good.

In his direct and no-fuss way, Hone Harawira has requested people join him in a campaign to have Christmas moved to January 25. I like his messaging.

Hopefully some in Auckland hold off and make later plans.

But it's Christmas. Many Aucklanders, who will have been living under lockdown restrictions for nearly four months will, understandably, be keen to get out of the city. Particularly if they've got friends and family in the north.

If it were Christmas Day under normal circumstances and you were in charge of Christmas dinner, and the guests started arriving before you were ready, the only thing to do is be hospitable. You offer them a drink and get them to make the coleslaw.

The stakes are at another level with people arriving in the north potentially, and unknown to them, carrying the Delta variant. The principle might be the same, though. We have no choice but to be hospitable.

Getting angry at people arriving from other parts of the country, even if it's from fear and apprehension, isn't going to help anything.

Christmas can be stressful at the best of times, but this year Delta makes the festive season even more worrying.

We will have to make the best of the situation and put our best faces on behind our masks.

The date the country has settled on for allowing travel to resume is a compromise. Like all compromises, it can leave many people feeling like it's not ideal.

To Northland's health workers, fearing low vaccination rates in remote rural areas long distances from the nearest hospital, allowing unrestricted travel to all parts is a big concern. The same for Māori leaders worried about lower vaccination rates among Māori (though big strides are being made).

For our very old people and the immune compromised, fear of Covid will never be completely eradicated.

And parents of children under 12 will be feeling some anxiety.

Although the effect of the virus is muted on the young, it's not nothing. Kids are ending up in hospital. No one wants that.

On the flip side, not seeing friends and family over Christmas would disappoint many.

And the continuation of travel restrictions would have been unpopular with Northland hospitality businesses at their hoped-for busiest time of year.

December 15 is a date that balances competing opinions and interests.

One of the essential ingredients to people getting along, whether in a family, a community or a whole society, is understanding other people's fears. Being all gung-ho about the Auckland border coming down isn't sympathetic to others who might have a genuine reason for being apprehensive.

That's why I hate the idea - borrowed from overseas - of labelling a date when Covid restrictions are removed as some kind of "Freedom Day".

It's a misrepresentation of extremely difficult decisions, which will have terrible consequences for some individuals.

Celebrating a "Freedom Day" without thought to others in your community still at risk of Covid is bad taste - something our headline writers in the media should keep in mind.
For people who will soon be visiting Northland from the rest of the country, there's a responsibility to be a good guest.

Pitching in means masking up and adhering to the restrictions under the traffic light system.

And if it's not too much to ask: have some empathy for Northlanders who are fearful of what the health situation might be after Christmas.

Please excuse us if we're more reserved than we would normally be, a little less jolly.

What's being asked of Northlanders this Christmas is no small thing.