{"id":15782,"date":"2020-03-12T06:50:13","date_gmt":"2020-03-11T21:50:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/commentisfree\/2020\/mar\/12\/advice-from-a-country-with-regular-shortages-stop-hoarding-toilet-paper-get-ready-for-boredom"},"modified":"2020-03-12T06:50:13","modified_gmt":"2020-03-11T21:50:13","slug":"advice-from-a-country-with-regular-shortages-stop-hoarding-toilet-paper-get-ready-for-boredom-dan-mcgarry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/?p=15782","title":{"rendered":"Advice from a country with regular shortages: stop hoarding toilet paper, get ready for boredom | Dan McGarry"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In Vanuatu, where cyclones regularly interrupt trade, we are watching the west\u2019s collective panic with bemusement<\/p>\n<p>I\u2019ve lived in the south Pacific island nation of Vanuatu for 16 years. Tropical weather regularly interrupts trade. Even when they\u2019re hundreds of kilometres away, cyclones wreak havoc on shipping. Isolation and deprivation define our lives. We know better than most how to cope.<\/p>\n<p>So imagine our bemusement when we see <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/commentisfree\/2020\/mar\/09\/rationing-stockpiling-and-vera-lynn-coronavirus-has-made-us-more-british-than-ever\">ranks of empty shelves<\/a> in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2020\/mar\/09\/rolling-in-the-aisles-australians-turn-to-tiktok-to-mock-toilet-paper-panic-buying\">Australia<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/lightyouonfire\/status\/1236560548075995137?s=20\">New Zealand<\/a>, the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2020\/mar\/08\/coronavirus-stockpiling-supermarkets-toilet-paper-hand-gel\">UK<\/a> and the USA, denuded by people who pretty clearly have never dealt with a shortage before.<\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/commentisfree\/2020\/mar\/12\/advice-from-a-country-with-regular-shortages-stop-hoarding-toilet-paper-get-ready-for-boredom\">Continue reading&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In Vanuatu, where cyclones regularly interrupt trade, we are watching the west\u2019s collective panic with bemusementI\u2019ve lived in the south Pacific island nation of Vanuatu for 16 years. Tropical weather regularly interrupts trade. Even when they\u2019re hundr&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":673,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sns_share_botton_hide":"","vkExUnit_sns_title":"","_vk_print_noindex":"","sitemap_hide":"","_veu_custom_css":"","veu_display_promotion_alert":"","vkexunit_cta_each_option":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[41,1069,914,512,916,874,299,282,323,42],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15782","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-asia-pacific","category-coronavirus-outbreak","category-infectious-diseases","category-medical-research","category-microbiology","category-pacific-islands","category-science","category-south-pacific","category-vanuatu","category-world-news"],"veu_head_title_object":{"title":"","add_site_title":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15782","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/673"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=15782"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15782\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15783,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15782\/revisions\/15783"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=15782"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=15782"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=15782"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}