Girlfriend in car’s boot shows us two things

Love, it is said, conquers all. But in South Africa, it was not nearly enough to beat the cops at a roadblock enforcing the coronavirus lockdown regulations.

So, a Romeo who clearly needed his Juliet to be able to weather the privations of his self-isolation, ended up being arrested for real, when the cops discovered her hiding in the boot of his car, which had been stopped on the N12 highway.

He was, it turned, out, trying to smuggle her across the border from Gauteng into Mpumalanga, in defiance of the Disaster Management Act regulations, which prohibit unauthorised travel between provinces. And sadly, affairs of the heart are not considered “essential” by those who laid down the rules.

Both the man and the woman were taken into custody after she admitted she had agreed to being “smuggled” across provincial lines.

This little booty call shows two things: that the lockdown is imposing serious relationship strains on many people and that, as a nation, one of our many characteristics is impatience.

Perhaps this an opportune moment to remind Romeo that there is an old saying which goes that anyone can say “I love you”, but not everyone can wait and prove it.

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