Reality Checks During Pandemic

We haven’t conquered Covid-19 yet and as long as it is our guest, it will keep giving us the reality checks.

So let’s go back in March, 2020 and think about the reality checks it has given from the beginning.

Maids

The absence of maids during lockdown made us realise, how much we rely on them! And more than women, it was a reality check for men. It made them realise, how much do they help women in performing household chores! We faced difficulties in the beginning but then we realised we can survive without maids. If the whole family comes together then we don’t need maids.

Nature

When we were locked in our houses, nature got an opportunity to heal itself. Ducks were back in Venice, Dolphins were back in Mumbai and the Ozone layer started expanding itself. It was a clear sign (and a warning) that we should stop taking nature for granted.

Bonding

In the busy schedule, we hardly get family time but in the lockdown, we got the opportunity to spend quality time together. We got the opportunity to play games together. Not only with the family, but we also got a chance to revive old friendships. By bonding with family and friends after a long time, we realised that we have missed on a lot of stuff. The best part of this revived bonding was that even distance didn’t matter.

Life without work

When we run a rat race, we often crib about off time or a break from work and when we got a long break, we wished to go back to work in couple of days. People started taking stress; they started thinking about survival and the situation after COVID. Thus, anxiety made its way in our life. Hopefully, now people will value their work-life and stop cribbing about the break and off time.

Roof

We came to know about the importance of the roof over our heads when we saw daily wagers on the roads. It was a call for humanity. Some great souls came together and tried their best to reduce the difficulties and made sure that they have reached home safely. While most of the people understood the importance of roof over their heads, some were incorrigible. They simply wanted to be out of the house all the time. I wished to swap those people with daily wagers on the roads. It would have been a win-win situation.

Ramanand Sagar

Numbers proved that all the web series and every other source of entertainment are temporary, Ramayana & Mahabharat are permanent. Even earthquakes and cyclones gave the signals to watch them. On a serious note, lot of people relived their childhood, lot of families sat together to watch two epic tales as they used to do in the nineties. Most importantly, it taught us to live without multiplexes and theatres.

Savings

This pandemic is the biggest lesson for those who don’t believe in savings. You save money for this kind of situation. In this situation, if you don’t have money in your hand then you are hitting your mental health with a hammer. Lockdown has exhausted the savings of middle-class families. Thus people are pushed people towards a simpler lifestyle and fewer wants for the year and a half. And from now onwards, responsible people will spend less and save more.

Medical staff and other essential service providers

The medical staff is working tirelessly in this pandemic. Along with them, Police, Guards, Vegetable Vendors, Municipal office staff and NGOs have also put their maximum efforts to help people in these difficult times. In the beginning, hospitals were not taking any chance with the life of patients but as time is passing by, private hospitals are focusing on minting money and (some of the) government hospitals are doing disasters while dealing with COVID patients. People are losing lives because of the mismanagement of some hospitals. Families who are losing their loved ones due to mismanagement, their life will never be the same.

Long summer vacation with Chinese products and apps

This pandemic has cleared one thing, China wants to rule the world. The way China has taken advantage of the situation in Hongkong, Taiwan and even Ladakh, it is clear that they want to establish their authority in every country around them. And here, we are not even willing to give up (forget products) Chinese apps. It has been a long summer vacation with Chinese products and apps. Time has come to say goodbye to them. Numbers are in front of us and we shouldn’t wait for the government to impose a ban on them. We should understand the responsibility towards our nation and soldiers and should stop using them. We should do it at such a big scale that China shouldn’t even dare to think about planning such conspiracy again.

So these are the reality checks we got in this pandemic and I feel we will continue to get them until we beat corona. I might have missed some points. Let me know what do you feel about it and kindly put some light on the points or issues I missed in the comments section below.

I would like to take the baton from Noor Anand Chawla who wrote a beautiful fiction (related to this pandemic) and would like to pass it on to Neha Sharma who is growing into a great mom blogger with his son Nemit. She will share the next article.

The Blog train THE PANDEMIC THAT CHANGED OUR LIFE UPSIDE DOWN initiated by blogger Ila Varma  to bring the bloggers together to share numerous experiences of #pandemiclockdown2020.