2020- AN UNPRECEDENTED YEAR.
Began with
the usual gung-ho about having a ‘happy new year’, dancing, drinking, hugging,
throwing treacle in the air, balloons and fire-crackers lighting up the sky as
the world merrily bid good-bye to 2019.
A quiet
January, a few short holidays thrown in here and there, resolutions stand
broken and life gets on, seemingly normal, unsuspecting of the stealthily
crouching tiger in your back-yard.
By February,
reports filter in about a viral disease spreading in faraway China, where
people were being asked/ forced to stay at home, doctors being picked up and
transported for service to unknown destinations for an indefinite time.
Pictures of deserted Wuhan captured the imagination of millions across the
globe, yet for us, it was far too away. Life went on.
Early march,
Italy and Spain repulsed under the attack of the virus, now known as Covid-19
and the sand under the feet shook. Trips to European cities stayed suspended as
it was they who were affected. We were still denying its existence and went on with our
routine.
Mid- March,
international travelers brought the first few cases, a days’ Janata curfew
followed by first ever lockdown for next three weeks brought our country to a
grinding halt. International borders were sealed, air traffic halted and states
closed vehicular movement.
Migration of
a panicked, scared people working in other than their home states and now dying
to go home became a crisis of getting thrown out of their homes for fear of
bringing in the disease and deaths in uncountable numbers as they walked in
hordes from one state to another in blistering heat.
The virus
had attacked, pandemic was declared, hospitals burst at seams with patients
coming in with anything from a running nose to severe breathlessness and some dying
on hospital stretchers even before help could reach. ICUs seemed inadequate and
none knew which medicines worked.
The count
was rising and rising and rising!
Protocols
during the next few months got set and re-set even as hundreds of doctors, over-worked,
tired, breathless behind PPE kits, scared, affected and even dying of the illness,
kept their chin up and fought to snatch as many lives as could be from the
clutches of this monster virus.
Festivals,
gatherings, weddings, parties were banned and face-mask became the unique tiny
piece of apparel that would save hundreds of lives.
Economy took
the worst hit as businesses spiraled into oblivion, the biggest IT industry
moved inside homes of the millions of computer engineers, hotels closed down,
tourism stopped and movie theatres remained a memory for avid movie-goers.
The world had changed.
A new-normal had set in.
The year
slowly chugging towards its fag end is a little better today, protocols are in place, drugs are helping in most cases, sero-surveillance and testing are getting that magical dip in numbers, the
dipping counts and increasing recoveries, unburdening the massive weight of the health
care system as the economy and people movement limps back to sanity. Scientists across the world are in the race to find the magical bullet!
2020 is a
year no one will forget and no one wants to remember.
Here is a
list of the good, bad and the ugly!
WHAT WENT
OUT-
Trust.
Get-togethers,
weddings, parties, discotheques, social gatherings, meetings with relatives, going out-just like that.
Movies,
eating out, restaurants, bonhomie over craft beer, Gym work-outs,
cross-trainers and tread-mills running simultaneously, personal trainers helping you push that last weight.
Small and large businesses, shopping sprees in
malls, crowding in favorite shops for that exclusive item, gold buying in
festivals.
Short and
long vacations, international travel, flying without fear, night plying sleeper
coaches, packed trains.
School,
college, new books, new friends, old friends, smell of brown paper and scented
erasor, afternoon tiffin, canteen samosas, after- school sports coaching, tuition, classes, cycle rides to school and
back, screaming with excitement in packed buses taking them home, black-board
teaching, attendance, home-work, exams and results.
Parks and
gardens, beach-fronts and camping sites buzzing with butterflies and
delightfully prancing kids.
Public
transport, bursting-at-seams local trains and buses, gossip and house work in
cramped spaces of local trains, sweaty hands hanging in tiniest spaces of trains
and buses to reach home, pushing and jostling to break the serpentine queues, the
ubiquitous black and yellow, now mostly white taxi.
Hugs,
kisses, PDA’s, one-nights, hand-shakes, late-night adventures, long
drives.
WHAT CAME
IN-
The new normal.
Fear of
life.
Chirping
birds, flocks of crows and parrots and sparrows, an occasional leopard or a
mongoose or dolphins dancing on sea waves.
Clean air,
low pollution levels, less carbon di-oxide damage, green covers.
Families
together in large or cramped houses, increased inter-personal communication, more time with children, maid-less
homes, learning to cook, wash, iron, clean, and also familiarity breeding
irritation, domestic problems and violence, separations, divorces.
Less
traffic, less consumption of energy fuels.
You-tube cooking, baking, new business ideas, new survival techniques
WHAT WE LEARNT-
That majority of the work goes on without having to move into tiny cubicles called offices- in short the concept of WFH.
The idea that irrespective of availability of extremely advanced health infra-structure, if you do not respect your body, an infinitesimally small particle will destroy it.
The idea that doctors fight just like the brave men and women protecting our borders but are human too and need to be cared for and respected just like every other element in the society.
The idea that life can go on without spending endlessly and recklessly.
The idea
that basic survival needs are very minimal.
The idea
that ‘big fat wedding’, gold, silver, property, assets are not the main reason of happiness.
The idea
that people we love, or who love us matter more than our race to reach the top.
The idea that we are ‘mortal’ with a limited time on hand.
YOLO.
WORDS WE
LOVED, HATED, FEARED, UNDERSTOOD, USED AND NEVER WANT TO HEAR AGAIN- ( in
Alphabetical order)
Antibody
Antigen
Borders
sealed
Bubble
Corona
Covid care
centres
Hand washing
ICMR
Lockdown- 1,
2.0, 3.0, 4.0, 5.0…………
Mask
Migration
Mission begin
Again
Nasal/throat
swab
Pandemic
Quarantine
Rt-PCR
Social
distancing
Ventilators
Virus
Webinars
WHO
Zoom
meetings
THE ONLY
WORD THE WORLD IS WAITING FOR-
VACCINE
Wishing all
a hopeful 2021
Dr. Reina
Khadilkar
