street view

I've taken quite a few rural views recently, but today I was in the town and interested in capturing some urban details. This is the window of the Doonhamer* restaurant which closed because of the coronavirus pandemic. It had been a popular eating place  for over 50 years. In the reflection you can see on the right The Usual Place, which is the cafe where I work, and on the left, Rico's Tuck Shop, which thrives mainly because of its location opposite Dumfries Academy.

Today we had actual customers in the cafe! Some of our regulars were invited in for training purposes, going through the test and protect procedures, ordering drinks and cakes and giving feedback to help us to give the best and safest service we can when we open our doors to the public (hopefully next week).

Until lunchtime today, my role was to clean the toilets and to mentor a trainee to help him understand the processes involved and why they are necessary. There are 5 toilets in the cafe; one of these is a changing places toilet and another has baby changing facilities. As well as cleaning the actual toilets, we have to sanitise all the fixtures, fittings, door handles, etc. We have to go through stocking up the trolley with cleaning fluids, extra toilet rolls, rubbish bags etc. We have to explain about wearing protective equipment - plastic aprons, gloves and masks - and about changing these between different areas. We have to talk about washing our hands before and after, about disposing of the cleaning waste safely and about restocking the trolley afterwards. There is a lot for a trainee to remember (for me as well!). The 5 toilets get cleaned every hour throughout the day, and inbetween, we were spot cleaning in the cafe. 

After lunch, we switched to serving drinks and cakes, sanitising trays, menus and table numbers. I hope the customers felt reassured by all this attention to detail.

With all the stringent requirement to keep customers and staff safe , it isn't surprising that businesses like the Doonhamer can't survive this pandemic, which is a real shame.

* a Doonhamer is someone who comes from Dumfries :-)