2020: Boon or Bane
When the clock ticked 12 and the year changed, we could all hear the hustle, bustle and cheers of welcome. As the tradition goes, people bid adieu to the passing year and hoped the new year to bring fortunes. 2020 was welcomed with lots of hope and aspirations. People all over the globe celebrated this with utmost job, making resolutions, some of which were broken the very next day :P and some that would be changing someone’s life. Everyone was ready to tick off their goals, some sooner some later. But while everyone was busy welcoming the unknown, one part of the world was feeling the sorrow rise. China became the epicentre of a pandemic outbreak: The birth of COVID-19 virus. What had started a couple of weeks ago as one patient in Wuhan, turned out to be a much more disastrous scare, one which the rest of the world was unaware of yet.
Categorised as one of the deadliest genomes of virus to ever exist, this was the beginning of a long wedged war against death. Starting from China and failing to be contained, this virus spread throughout the globe, sparing no race, no gender, no age. What was initially localised at Wuhan, now spread its wings across the entire globe. January saw the rise of cases, though at a steady rate, but unstopped. By February end, most of the countries had traces of this virus entering their territories. And by mid March , almost all countries on the globe had fallen victim to this deadly virus. What was more fearsome was the fact that the virus not only affected the person who was infected, but it passed on to others like a chain reaction. Every person could be viewed as a human bomb, ready to infect anybody who comes in contact. And no country, mark my words, no country could find a way to tackle this situation.
What followed the breakout is one of the rarest events to have ever happened in our lifetime. Millions of people were affected, thousands died. Every country closed the gates to travellers, to save its own and stop the spread. Travelling stopped, airlines, railways and roadways shut. Different governments imposed lockdowns to curb the infection. Businesses were hit, economies crippled.A state of chaos had engulfed the entire humanity. It seemed as if the world had come to a stand still. There was an evident fear on everyone’s face, as never seen before. People could not meet others, maintain physical distance. What seemed as basic necessity turned luxury: no going out freely, no contact to people, no travelling and scarcity of everything one could think of. Be it the poor or the rich, the powerful or the weak, everyone learnt fear. From the riches doing things they earlier thought to be below their level to the poor suffering of scarcity, nobody was spared. Mankind had learnt a lesson: Do not hurt nature, it will hurt you back.
It is often said that no matter how bad the circumstances are, no matter how down we fall ,some good shall always happen. In today’s time, where time is equivalent to money, the social priorities took a back seat, even if it is for a short time. For most of the people, this much needed break turned out to be a boon out of a bane. Humans have been given a chance to check their perspective, to look back at their life and introspect what they have missed, to reflect on their past actions. With the comforts of life being stripped, people have resorted to self service. Today, most of us are homebound, with our families, trying to rekindle the lost emotional connect. Over the past two months, we have all learnt back the value of relationship, the value of having someone around. Parent are connecting back with their children, brother and sisters amongst. It has been a good time reminiscing the olden days, something this busy life kept us away from. A sense of belongingness has reemerged, for some at least. The sounds of multiple laughters out of a house, discussions happening, some love and some quarrels has filled the entire world with a buzz. And somewhere sometime, we can see a sense of relief on a mother’s face, a sense of security on a child’s. For those who are staying alone, it is not all lost. It has established a sense of responsibility and enhanced the survival skills. While most of the professional obligations still stay, people have learnt to manage time to deal with professional life and take care of their own household. What was weekly or monthly communication between kins is now a daily catchup.
On the other front, nature has been rapidly healing itself. The flora and fauna have flourished. Some of the almost extinct species of animals have been sighted. Migratory birds are seen flocking in large numbers. Pollution levels have gone down incredibly. Some of the most polluted cities now face no urgent threat, breathing conditions have improved by far. The rivers have cleaned up. Unimaginable improvements have been witnessed in the waters of Venice canals in Italy and Yamuna River in India, amongst many others. The atmosphere has cooled down, much to the relief of all. The large hole in the ozone layer has filled up. According to recent researches, Global warming threats have gone down magically, healing and improving Earth like it was more than a decade ago.
We have all learnt a lot from this experience. The most important thing we realised as a whole is that the biggest luxury of life is life itself. If not for the fear of life, we would still have continued with the the pace of life, ignoring a lot of more important things. The fear of death has brought the entire world to face this threat together. For once, we have stopped thinking about boundaries and embraced others with the same warmth. We have all learnt to respect and be grateful to the small things in life, respect the people around us. There is one thing we have all learnt for sure: TO CARE ABOUT OURSELVES AND OTHERS.
