Quarantined: A Corona Story

   “Corona is such a nice thing!” chirped the younger one.

                After the children’s final examinations, we had taken a very short break to go to Manali – a place where we enjoyed to the fullest. I came back to my workplace while the children accompanied their mother to their grandparents. Just before the school was to reopen, however, we got the news about extension of the opening date due to the Corona pandemic. The situation had elicited this strange and irregular response from the younger child.

                And they had good reason to rejoice. They had their cousin, grandparents, uncle, aunt and mother together with them in a large three storied house, complete with a rooftop garden, and their grandmother’s on demand delicacies.

                The house they were holed in was on a very busy street. On a normal day, it is very difficult to even talk with the doors or windows open. However, following lockdown, the streets wore a deserted look, except during evening when grocery shops would open for a brief period. Later, police would come to clear the streets, the entire street would be filled with spectacle of people running away from cane yielding policemen. Frequently there would be an odd person getting beaten up, or being punished by the policemen. The entire scene typically continued for around quarter of an hour every evening without fail. The girls and their cousin readily took to this new form of entertainment from the rooftop every evening after they had finished watering the plants.           

                Apart from these small moments, they also made grand plans. One such plan consisted of having special program in the evening for the entire family to participate. The entire evening would consist of an arrangement of tea with home cooked snacks, a family game and a couple of song or dance performance by the family. My niece is a trained Bharat Natyam dancer, and she happily volunteered to train the girls in some small dance number. My Father – in – law happily took the opportunity to showcase his newly acquired singing talent – he has picked up classical training after his retirement. Other family members also chipped in. They called it “Quarantine Masti”. Extensive planning ensued for the next couple of days, resulting in some video-worthy performances which were widely shared to all distant family members and greatly appreciated. But then, the girls got bored of this routine and simply gave up. An important consideration was the need of my niece to get back to her books – she is studying to appear for medical entrance examinations this year.

                Roughly at the same time, the national broadcasters – DoorDarshan – decided to repeat a series of its best programs, including the classic Ramayan and Mahabharat. These disrupted the entire time table, and their life has been revolving around the episodes ever since.

For the remainder of time, the girls have invented a game of hockey played with their slippers. The elder daughter has also been drawing and sketching a lot. My wife tries to, and generally succeeds, get them to solve a few sums of mathematics and watch a few video lessons of science every day.

The national lockdown is far from over, and we do not know what the future holds. It is highly likely that the school will reopen after simmer break. While I am away from the rest of the family, I try to talk to my wife and the kids every day.

During one such conversation with the elder girl, she complained about the continued lockdown. “When will the school open?” she wailed. “I want to go school.”