This is going to be my first post in Life category. Though I had this in my mind when I initially created this blog, I wondered on what to write and now I found a deadly topic to start with. Let me start with why I created this post. It was terrifying to think about this everyday and it felt absolutely depressing reading about this for months now and I needed a way to channelize that.. Don’t worry, I am not going to put you into depression, but I am exploring something different.

Jan 2020

Amidst US- Iran conflicts and Australian bush-fire season, I read somewhere in the middle pages about the Corona virus in China coming from bats etc and I hardly paid any attention to that as the other news were more terrifying.

By the end of Jan, the message was clear, Wuhan is completely locked down and the victim count increased tremendously attracting the whole world’s attention. I got to read more details about the virus and how it spread from an illegal animal market in Wuhan, China. Till that point of time, I didn’t hear the name Wuhan and I thought it was a small town, but to realize soon that it was a huge city and business people keep traveling to the place often.

The whole world got alerted due to lock down, banned travel and flights to/from Wuhan and parts of mainland china and assumed everything will be alright.

Feb 2020

It was my first international trip in times of Corona. I didn’t take it seriously, but I observed many people wearing masks in the plane and wondered if it is mandatory. I had a transit in Singapore and the airport looked fine and normal. By the time I reached India, I think the news went big and the immigration started asking questions about travel history. We were asked to fill a form with our personal details, travel history to mainland china and check to see if any symptoms are seen. It was mostly a self declaration form which was given to all the flight passengers. The software which was developed quickly or not given training properly stopped working at immigration counters refusing to take our details and we had to wait in the queue for an hour to get that fixed. I wondered on why it was essential to note down passenger details from every flight and I wished they did it to only people with travel history to China. In Hyderabad airport, I observed that most of the ground staff wore masks and one person at customs questioned me on why I didn’t wear one. I was little terrified at his question, but later comforted myself thinking that my flight is from Singapore and there is not much risk there.

After few days, I caught bad cold, cough and faced slight respiratory issues , which I felt were related to cold which gave me sleepless nights for around 10 days. I had a doubt deep within me if I was exposed to the virus somewhere on the flight. But I attributed the main reason of that to my sudden dust exposure in India after staying more than a year breathing clean air in Australia. Till date, I don’t know the real reason though, it could be some kind of flu. Since I was in India attending functions, I hardly got time to read whats happening in the world outside.

I traveled along with my parents from India back to Australia. This time Singapore airport was also on high alert with masks all around and we were also very careful observing people around us. There were not many checks as we reached Sydney. At immigration, we were just asked a question about our travel history to mainland china and we said no and that was it. I felt very happy that it was not a painful process and reached our home.

After going back to office in Sydney, I realized that people here were very scared about this new virus and they got a week of wfh just to be safe. Kids also got their summer holidays extended. I got to know that it was spread to Italy, Iran, South Korea and to a cruise ship which was waiting to dock somewhere. My colleague who didn’t know that I had been to India wondered if I was stuck on that cruise 😛 Things looked good in Australia and people were back to offices and kids returned to schools. I thought the panic ended and soon things will get to normal. Another point which I felt reassuring was that it was winter in Northern hemisphere and summer for Australia in Feb. I heard that viruses cannot sustain in higher temperatures and considered ourselves in a pretty safe situation.

Meanwhile, I read many conspiracy theories and stories around this virus with stories that it was leaked from a virology lab etc which felt scary and the way the stories were described felt very convincing. But as a person with faith in humanity, I rubbished these rumors and believed to have originated from bats. The stories also included two books from 1980’s where the mention of this virus was present. They looked very coincidental.

Oh, yes. Corona got a new unique name “COVID-19”. I wish they change the name every month to reduce panic in public 😛

Mar 2020

This is THE PANIC month I should say, with every day starting with corona live report. The virus started spreading everywhere and more countries started reporting cases. India reported its first case from Dubai in Hyderabad and I was concerned about India considering its population. The count started increasing in Australia too from overseas visitors. Markets started tumbling all over the world as every major country reported issues.

Now that it reached India, my whatsapp is filled with various tips from all over the country on what foods are good and how to avoid Corona etc of which I felt increasing the Vitamin C intake suggestion was the useful one and started following that at home.

People started stocking necessary items to prepare for a possible isolation demanded by government. The first item that went out of stock is toilet paper and it became a huge topic of discussion all around Australia. It went to an extent that all major supermarkets were devoid of toilet paper and there were many fights that happened for that. I guess the funny or crazy side of people comes out when they are in panic mode. Guess what, even we too bought a pile of it, just like that, following the trend 😛 I really liked this image from twitter:

Amidst all these, I was concerned about our New Zealand trip scheduled on 21st March and we still have our fingers crossed about that. I have been checking the case counts in Australia and New Zealand and wishing things get better soon. India banned tourists from all over the world from entering India, which was a bold move. I was worried if Australia also does the same as soon as we go out on the trip and we will be left in the middle of nowhere. I spoke to both Australian and NZ immigration to check if it is fine to continue with our trip and they gave us a green signal asking us to be careful in airports.

Now its time for Italy to lock down itself to avoid transmission to other countries. Travel ban extended to more countries with US extending it to entire Europe barring UK. Trump who earlier ignored this virus as a regular flu, started worrying about it and tried to do everything to keep the markets happy. No measures could stop the blood bath though.

WHO declared the virus as a global pandemic. Our companies asked us to work from home as there is a considerable risk of virus spreading in AC offices. It feels extremely boring to work from home, amidst the negativity all over. Every company wants the business to be as usual with people not in as usual state. Going back to Maslow’s law of hierarchy, being at 2nd level, its tough to think about next levels sometimes.

The latest story around this virus is that it is spreading more in 40^N latitude with Wuhan, South Korea, Iran, Italy, New York and Seattle all lying on that latitude. This sounds very reasonable and believable that the environment there might be conducive to virus. Its too early to conclude anything as we still have to wait and watch how it spreads in other countries.

Tom Hanks and his wife were tested positive with Corona in Australia and the country made it into headlines now with this news. Luckily, it was concluded that they got the virus before they reached Australia from United States itself creating less damage to Australia’s reputation and reducing people’s scare.

Now that the corona scare looks like a new normal, I realized that there is nothing much in my hands to do and be normal and entertain myself by writing blog posts like this 🙂 I deleted twitter app on my phone to reduce the panic and enjoy life!

March 14th

New announcement has been made by New Zealand government that all international tourists entering the country should self-isolate themselves for 14 days. The most dreaded thing happened. We are left with no option but to cancel our trip next week as we planned to go there for a week and it’s not possible to isolate ourselves there. End of my New Zealand dreams 😦

March 15th

Earlier I used one month interval for a chronicle. But now life is changing every day particularly this month. Today we planned to pack our bags and we ended up working on all our trip cancellations!

Airbnb has been really proactive in cancellations and refunds. I could cancel it online and get full refund in a click of button. Car rentals cancellation is also completed in single step. Coming to the most important and the toughest one, the flight cancellation. We booked it through Expedia and we couldn’t reach their customer service number even after holding the call for around 3hrs. There was no option to cancel it online as well. Better luck tomorrow!

It’s Australia’s turn now to copy New Zealand to impose self isolation on international arrivals for 14days. They additionally added a huge fine for those who doesn’t follow the isolation. If our trip was on, we would have been in isolation for two weeks in NZ and then two weeks in Australia once we were back! Crazy times for travel.

March 16th
Australia reported 50 cases in a day, the highest growth so far. It feels like the epidemic started spreading here locally. Thinking back about our New Zealand trip now, it feels safe to be at home than travel in flights and take a chance, particularly with parents along.

March 17th
We woke up with the news that India is going to ban the entry of Indian Nationals also from Europe starting March 19th. My husband’s brother is scheduled to depart from Estonia to India on 20th March, after his education. So, we had to book flight on 17th March to evacuate him from there.

I expected booking a flight ticket to be an easy job now, compared to cancellation. But it was found to be equally challenging as websites started hanging because of huge load. We had to try five times to finally book the ticket. Luckily, we got to book the last flight from Europe via Frankfurt 🙂

+100 cases in Australia today!

After 4 hours of waiting on call to reach Expedia customer service, I successfully could talk to an agent today and get my itinerary cancelled. Though the airlines provided credit for cancellations, their terms and conditions look a little complicated. As per the cancellation terms, the credit should be used on the same travel itinerary, which is only on the flight to New Zealand before a year and it should be used for the same names. Crazy rules, if only visa remains by then! I am not even sure if travel insurance works in this case.

March 18th

The last flight from Frankfurt that we booked for my husband’s brother got cancelled and he was forced to stay back in Europe for sometime, not sure how long. We have to check if Indian government evacuates him or if the restrictions will ease over time. Life is looking like a thriller movie with twists and turns every day. We generally enjoy thriller movies, but we never wish to face that in real life :P.

This live updates tab is always open on my laptop while working these days:- https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

Today I decided to work from our local library, just for change. As I packed my bag and reached library, there was an update there saying that the library would be open only for lending and returning books and people are not allowed to sit there starting today as per new regulations from the government. As I mentioned before, nothing is going as per the plan these days. The moral of the story is just follow the wave and not to plan anything separately. We should never try to swim in a Tsunami, rather wait for it to go and then start swimming 😀

March 19th-20th

Australia announced ban on entry of international visitors into the country. Only Australian citizens and permanent residents are allowed inside, that too followed by 14 days of self isolation. It was a very good step by government and we quickly realized that this was also copied from New Zealand as well. They implemented it few days before. Officially, Australia is now disconnected from the world. I am hoping that the numbers eventually come down in a month.

Unfortunately, my parents’ flight which is scheduled to depart one month from now is cancelled by Singapore Airlines. None of our family was surprised to hear the news. Looks like we are anticipating this move, but it was too early I felt for the airlines to cancel it. Today marks the Hat-trick day of cancellation saga. I was not much worried about reaching customer care as we have some time and I filled an online form for cancellation. I shouldn’t be doing any cancellation ideally, but only one flight was cancelled in the trip, which is Singapore to Sydney. So, we had to raise request for the other leg of the journey.

March 21st-22nd

Weekends no longer feel the same, I found it more frustrating this time. We are usually busy during weekdays with work, with little time left for news or anything. Sitting at home without doing much also feels difficult. I think we feel like doing things which we were asked not to do, like going out to a park, beach etc.. Not everyone could resist the temptation I think. This Saturday it was very hot by Sydney standards and plenty of people flocked to beaches across Sydney. Bondi beach was filled of people and it made the policy holders realize that they have to be really strict.

On Sunday there were orders to close all the beaches and still some people didn’t pay much attention to the rules.

WHO and the government is particularly unhappy with the mentality of youth and students across and sent strong warnings across telling them that they are not invincible. Just that the death ratio is less doesn’t mean it is not affecting young people. I have read about many people in 20’s and 30’s who were hospitalized and had to be treated in ICU’s. Keeping that apart, even if there are no symptoms, they would act as carriers and spread the virus across to other vulnerable population around. I am not sure if this message reaches people around, but I think it is high time governments put in strict rules and punishments to terrify people from doing these kind of acts.

A serious mistake done by government also came into notice this weekend(not sure who is responsible, federal and state government are still blaming each other). They allowed cruise ship passengers to disembark in Sydney Harbour without any checks though they were aware that there are some sick patients on board. 2300 passengers were let into Sydney city and one day later, they got to know that a person was positive with COVID-19. The authorities are now trying to reach each and every person on the cruise to inform them to self-isolate! These passengers were left free and they could have contacted many people and taken public transportation in these two days. This mistake is going to haunt NSW badly.

In India, one day Janata curfew has been observed on Sunday, followed by clapping in the evening to cheer healthcare workers and doctors across the country. It was quite successful, with only a few exceptions where people came outside and danced with drums and other musical instruments in the evening without following social distance measures.

March 23

By Monday morning, Australia is up by +638, with around 1700 cases. All states closed their borders after the cruise incident to safeguard their own states from increasing numbers. There was a heated discussion on schools and each state decided to take its own decision about it. Victoria decided to shut down schools. NSW decided to keep the schools open, but Premier advised parents to keep kids away from school. I didn’t understand this logic initially, but later realized that they want to keep schools open to give an option to parents who can’t keep their kids home, like in case of emergency and health workers. The schools now started online teaching.

Along with that, NSW and Victoria states decided to shut down non-essential services across the state which leaves only groceries, petrol stations and medical shops open.

India also decided to lock down major cities and some effected districts, allowing only one person in the family to come out for essential needs. US is slowly moving up and reached the third position in the chart after Italy in the number of cases with increase of around 9000 cases a day.

March 24

News about drugs for Corona has been under discussion for a while. Anti-HIV drugs were used initially and now anti-malarial drugs are being tested. Trump is suggesting the new drug, but it was not yet certified by FDA. With many medical researchers working on it, I am hoping some drug will soon come into picture to save infected people.

India went into complete lock down for a period of 21 days, with strict regulations all over the country. Only one person from the family can go out for any essential needs and everything else will remain closed. Even at the grocery stores, social distancing should be maintained. I felt it is a great move by the Indian government at this point of time. This is a national crisis and it is not easy to come out of this situation without a strict lock down. New Zealand also went into lock down along with many countries around the world. I am hoping for a similar lock down enforcement in Australia too.

March 25

While it is depressing to be at home all the time, many colleagues of mine asked me on what motivates me to work and stay at home. I found an article from Scott Kelly, the person who spent 1 year in space on his isolation experience. I also read his book “Endurance” (a must read) one year back and I could relate to his article on spending time in isolation. Lets analyze the situation of any astronaut who spent a year in International Space Station(ISS). There is no option to get out of that the shuttle and they are in complete isolation from the world, they can’t even see/feel any living object on earth from their window. They have to generate their own oxygen, have to eat only canned food and they can’t even stand properly, they keep floating and their life risk level is extremely high. They are highly prepared for everything and yet they are happy about spending time in space despite all the risks. The only thing that motivates them is their satisfaction of contributing to society towards a particular goal/bigger cause. I see that our challenge is much smaller than their challenge in all aspects and if we also feel responsible for the society around us, social distancing or isolation is equally fulfilling and enjoyable. It’s all in our attitude. The quicker we accept the situation, the better it is. Comparing myself to an astronaut made me feel happy and my colleagues also felt happy when I shared this insight with them to increase motivation levels.

March 26-27

US crossed the numbers of Italy and China in a single day. New York is the new epicenter of the pandemic. It felt shocking to see how US failed to handle this crisis and I am sure they could have controlled it in a better way.

While rest of the world is under lock down, Australia government is still waiting to see how it spans out over a period of time before they take drastic measures.

March 30

I got to read an amazing story, the Bet from CBSE 9th class book, which is apt for our current lock-down situation.

http://aliclassroom.weebly.com/uploads/6/1/2/2/61229617/the-bet_pdf.pdf

This time feels like a pause button in our life to reset our priorities and work towards them for rest of our life and it is a much needed break in this busy world.

April

Though its been only 15 days that the lockdown/work from home started, it feels like forever. I hope there will be good signs of recovery this month. New South Wales state government announced lockdown till June end which is another three months. I started wondering about so much negativity around and even ventured into astrology these days to check when things will be alright. Surprisingly, many astrologists across the world predicted bad time starting of this year due to conjunction of Mars, Jupiter and Saturn. Most of them are confident that this effect will reduce by June end. In December, most of them are expecting change in global power equation due to interchange in positions of Jupiter and Saturn. I was surprised by the fact that many people predicted it and it cannot be that bad a coincidence and wondered what kind of effects can planets have on us. A completely new dimension to explore!

Cases have been continuously increasing in US. New York figures are turning scary day by day. The numbers are predicted to peak around Easter, after which they plan to reopen their economy. Australia daily case count started decreasing to double digits now. India further extended the lockdown till May 4th, due to many cases that emerged out of a religious event that happened in Delhi around March 13th.

May

This month started with easing of restrictions across the world, as the economies are suffering. Though the cases count didn’t decrease, many countries are left with no option but to open their country with social distancing in place. Luckily, Australia’s curve got flattened with single and double digit growth for over few weeks now. Of course, we are now entering winter and we never know if some rebound can happen in this season. As with any other country, its been around 50 days of lockdown and restrictions have started easing. Countries came up with different stages of lockdown at this stage.

New Zealand claimed to have eliminated the virus completely and there have been discussions happening about opening Australia borders to New Zealand and Pacific nations. Now, that the lock down looks like the new normal and I bought myself a home office desk and chair anticipating more days of wfh in future. I was super excited on this purchase and it brought me joy 🙂 I am now counting my moments of joy, as happiness might take sometime. I am listening to more podcasts that keep me positive and curious to look forward in life.

On the other hand, cases in India and US are still increasing and there are no signs of slowing down. Nations are trying to walk on a tight rope, trying to choose between lives and economy, which are both essential. Many people lost their jobs and enrolled themselves on Job Keeper. Though there were many news about vaccines, there were no breakthroughs yet and it now feels like vaccine is a long shot. The current lifestyle might be the new normal for this year.

I started going out for walks these days and found fall colors all around. I am hoping that they ease restrictions very soon to allow us on long drives before the fall color season ends.

June

This month is so far looking positive with respect to Corona. In India, almost everything is opened up. Australia is also opening up and encouraging regional travel within the state, which is a good sign. The news about Corona virus started decreasing or may be some more horrible news came up reducing this effect. No one is yet sure on how this is going to end, but I think this month marks the end of lock down across many countries. Countries are thinking more about reviving economies and companies thinking about opening offices in a phased manner. The layoff season also started officially with many companies across the world, asking employees to leave due to business reasons. Unemployment appears to be at peak now. It is very tough to get things back to normal and I am hoping life will be back to normal at least by end of this year. I am sure no one is going to forget 2020 in their life time.

July 2020 – Nov 2020

Everyone got so used to new COVID normal now as there is no other choice left 😛 While some people are praying for the vaccine to come soon, some are praying for the year to end soon 😀 I still remember how people celebrated the new year of 2020, new decade etc, but the happiness didn’t even last for two months. That’s how uncertain life has turned into these days. People had enough entertainment in the form of US elections and Cricket IPL season.

Pfizer came up with a COVID vaccine that is proven to be 90% effective. That’s the only ray of hope for now with many vaccines in the pipeline.

When I started this post, I expected it to end soon, but this is going on like a never ending saga! I am waiting for a day to put an end to this post, one perfect day 🙂

That’s all for now. I will keep you updated. Stay safe and more importantly strong! 🙂