Such a strange time

 Hello. I have decided to start a blog during this very strange time of our lives. The covid-19 era. No, this is not going to be one of those monetised blog that would help you plan your meals, or make you better parents. I just simply want to record this very strange experience of my life, which I hope I will never get to experience ever again. But maybe, hopefully, one day in the future, when all of this is over, when words like “social distancing, mask, community cases, lockdown” are things of the past, I could look back and smile (or cry) at what happened around me, or with me, during that strange time. 


If you’ve found this blog in the very very distant future, the year is 2021. We are currently over half way through our second year living with this pandemic called the CoVid-19. I am living in Canberra, Australia. Which, as of this moment, surprisingly, have ZERO cases. Yep, that is very strange. Sydney, a big city 3 hrs drive from us, is having a major outbreak. 200-300 new cases per day. But Canberra is still safe. Maybe we have been protected by something, or maybe Canberrans are just smart. Anyhow, I feel very lucky to be here.

However, conditions change quickly. If we get one community case by tomorrow, then we would be in total lockdown. 

I am originally from Indonesia. At the moment, Indonesia is failing super hard in handling covid, We’re talking 30k cases a day, thousands of death a day. My parents are still living there. Friends I’ve known since 10-15 years ago... are still living there. So even though I am “safe” here in Canberra, there is not one day when I don’t think about them. I feel scared for them. I feel sad for them. I also wonder when would I see them again. 

At the moment, I no longer feel hopeful about this virus. In my darkest and most hopeless thought, I think this would be the end of us. Some of us might be feeling “safe” at the moment, but I got a feeling that the virus would mutate into something even worse (at the moment it has mutated into Delta variant, which is pretty deadly), and eventually get to all of us. But hey, I’m always a “glass half empty” kind of gal, so.... I could be wrong. Prove me wrong, virus!

And if the virus ended up proving me wrong, then at least when I’m super old, this would be the hardship story that I am going to tell my grand kids. You know, like some grandparents in Indonesia would say “I survived the Japanese occupation! I watch the Japanese soldiers murdered my own father in our living room” (true story in my grandma’s family btw). I could tell my grandkids “I survived Covid-19, which is worse than the terrorists. When we were in lockdown, I made your dad clean the garden by telling him it’s ‘water play’. Your dad was 4 years old.” (I have a son)



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