Being the "go-to-guy" of the household for about a year now, no thanks to the pandemic, I have the opportunity to observe how the hoipolloi follow minimum health protocols on Covid-19 and on restrictions.
It has been basically, a house-to-market thing and vice versa for exactly a year now for me or since the outbreak of the virus in March last year.
Or at times, periodically, on a monthly basis, I go inside a bank to pay bills in nearby Tanauan City, a border city of Sto. Tomas.
I would say that health protocols are at their worst inside our Sto. Tomas City public market, a flipside when you go to a bank where social distancing is followed down to the letter because, perhaps, the presence of security guards.
And then, yes, a flipside of it when you visit the public market of STC.
We don't intend to demean people or vendors inside the market for I have a lot of suki in the wet section, vegetable, fruit, and dry sections, and even a certain barbershop inside the palengke.
I just hate to see it day in and day out that they barely follow health protocols, and it seems not even the market administrator is aware of this.
Yes, they all have masks but no face shields. Worse, almost all of them are not wearing their face masks properly.
Masks should be worn covering the nose and mouth. But, lo, and behold, almost all of them wear it under their chin, and that defeats the purpose.
And they keep on talking, conversing with each other, exchanging jokes and everything while selling their meat products. With it, the spread of the virus is at its peak.
The worst thing yet is they breath down the slab of meat you are buying while slicing them into your desired pieces as they have their chins covered not their mouth and noses.
Another thing is the limited space, narrow walkways. While buying a kilo of pork or beef, other buyers need to squeeze in your shoulders to pass through. That's a social distancing violation at its peak.
We tackled this before here on our corner and we'd like to believe modernization of Sto. Tomas City's public market is underway.
It's just that they really have to do it double-time. As in, ASAP.
Email ismaelamigo@yahoo.com.