The last few days have sort of allowed me to see life in a fresh perspective. What matters the most and what can go down the drain never seemed clearer before.
My 2019’th bday, husband and I had a big fight. On why he does not give me surprise gifts. On why everyone in the world gets Armanis and forever 21’s and gold and diamonds and I sort of have to go shop by myself. He got me a rose 2 days later, and I remembered telling him what good one rose will do, I cannot even cook it. Duh!
And then corona entered. We are all stuck at home since 3 weeks, not sure till how long. I never got to wear , leave an Armani or branded shirt, not even a decent shirt. I am always in pyjamas, not bothering about what time it is unless someone calls for a meeting, or there is a hunger reminder. Never got to wear those nice shoes matching with my amazing dress and matching earrings.
I get scared of ordering food outside. Or I am too lazy to sanitise it when it arrives. I depend on delivery options for groceries, which also I don’t trust and eventually have to leave it in balcony for 2 days and then use. I am scared of meeting my neighbours, or going down to the shop in condo and buy stuff.
When did I become so paranoid? Why am I living like this? More importantly what’s the point of living like this? The fact that what happens to me might pass on to my baby is the most dangerous thought in my mind right now. Gold and diamonds don’t even make a cut off here, as long as I have enough food for the week without going out.
In all this paranoia, our condo pipe burst 4 days ago. We were out of water midnight 3 am. We got up in the morning to find everything dry. The tankers arrived late, and the water was dirty and murky. Lack of clean water to wash hands did not help the present lockdown we were in. When it is advised to wash hands 20 times a day, we dint have water to do it even once.
I saw people filling buckets of water from swimming pool, the same pool that was closed 3 weeks ago due to corona. The same pool that wasn’t cleaned since 3 weeks. Leave corona, we have no idea what other infections we were exposed to. We cooked as required, cooked really simple food using minimum vessels, used minimum water to clean up. We kept ourselves clean , kept our hands in control so as to not clean up all the time. We changed clothes only once a day. I never thought we could survive 4 days with a bucket of water a day.
All this, while we were working from home and my son had classes and assignments online.
After what seemed like eternity, we got water today. Bless those people who worked continuous 4+ days to get water to 600 families here. They worked even with MCO lockdown. They worked even when their offices have declared they don’t expose themselves too much. They worked in their home clothes, in rain, in dark, with minimum resources. The people thanked the management office, the local MP, the building committee, but none of them addressed these common people, common uneducated people who sacrificed their sleep while we were sleeping in our comfortable beds cribbing about how deprived we were.
The sad part being, I cannot even go and see them, thank them, thanks to the lockdown. This is what made me realise , what kind of place we are living in. A place where the simplest and the most menial jobs , but the most important jobs are looked down upon, are rewarded much less. What good will I do to myself being a software engineer, when I still depend on an electrician or a plumber , or my maid to make my living easier, and still pay them way less than they deserve.
The best example – I wouldn’t risk my life to go solve customer problem onsite. Why should I expect workers to come fix my problem risking their life? Still I did. And they risked their life for my convenience. Hence, my decision, rather my family’s decision.
Everytime you think of buying something nice for ourselves, think. Like really think. Do we want it? Need it? If not, then please spare the money and make someones life. Donate. Or put in FD for a poor kid. Sponsor someone’s education. Just buy clothes to someone in need. Give a raise to your maid. If you have time, volunteer in a soup kitchen. In situations like this, they are the people very much in demand.
You can always buy expensive things with your next salary, u know, i.e. if you really want it. But once you know what it takes for survival, these things don’t even make sense. Also, who knows we will even come out of this corona situation 🙂 We might spend the next one year at home while all our gold and expensive stuffs are sitting in shelves getting rusted.
Today, I was happy to pay 20rm for a very small cauliflower. Because my effort was way less than the effort of that guy who went all the way to buy groceries. Because end of the day, money does not even matter. We are in lockdown, and we have food. Thats enough.
First corona, then water problem. Who knows what will come next. Live while you can. Help while you can. Make someone’s life when you can.
The world will face continuous draught for 40 years. Followed by continuous flood for an other 40 years. And thats how the world will end – Nostradamus.
World..through my eyes! 