What did I learn from Corona days?
1 I feel humble, because I know now everything is not in my hands.
2 I find a new solidarity with everyone in the world. Corona is not only my
problem, it is the problem of every one. Suddenly the entire world has
become one.
3 I learnt to be alone. If I catch Covid-19, I am isolated. If I had a contact
with one having this disease I am isolated and have to spend 14 to 28
days in isolation.
4 Forced to be alone I learnt to spend the time once again with books; I
find reading is enjoyable and enriching.
5 I learnt to spend more time with my family as I am clued to my home
due to continuous lockdowns.
6 Lockdown made me to learn new hobbies like cooking, gardening,
writing, drawing etc., because I have plenty of time.
7 I learnt to be generous. I look after the neighbor’s child because her
mother is in the hospital undergoing treatment for Covid-19. I spare a
share from my salary to feed my neighbour because the father of the
family lost his job. The poor widow of the Gospel has resurrected again!
8 I learnt my possessions are not my own. When others need they belong
to them. So joyfully I part with those which I thought are mine - my
house, my buildings, my hospitals and even my time.
9 I learnt to live with certain amount of fear and anxiety, that I may the
next person to go to the quarantine or to a Covid-19 hospital.
10 No matter my age, I am learning to accommodate the event of my death.
Who knows I may be the next victim of corona virus.
11 I have learnt to live with frugality, because the shops are not open, even
if they are open I am afraid of going out to the shop to buy; besides the
price is high due to shortage, no job for me, salary is drastically cut.
12 For the first time in my life I have seen with my own eyes the pathetic
situations of the poor in India as they (the migrant workers) from every
state walking and pedling on a bicycle carrying babies in their hands and
meagre belongings on their heads, miles and miles, days and days,
hungry and thirsty hoping to reach their home villages. And after
reaching…….?
13 I have learnt to maintain my spiritual life without rubrics and sacraments,
without conventions and religious gatherings because the churches and
spiritual centers remain closed indefinitely. Still I am more close to God
than ever before.
14 I have learnt religion in pandemic is not the same as in peceful times. It
needs heroism to practice my religion during a contagion.
15 When my parish Church was closed, my home became my church.
16 I have learnt faith is a hard matter. The entire world is praying since last
January 2020 onwards, still corona virus keeps stretching its wings
wider and wider. I am forced to ask many times, ‘lord, why are you deaf
to my supplications?’. Still I believe! Still I continue to pray!!
17 In sickness all of us are one. All the differences among us are washed
away like caste, color, race, religion, language etc. Covid-19 makes no
disctinction of any sort. All stay together in the covid-19 hospitals, in
the places of quarantine, even in the burial ground.
18 I have learnt my profession is not to make money but a God-given
occasion to serve others in need.
19 As a doctor, as a nurse, I learnt to take risks to help the needy. Who
bothers if in this process corona finds a lodgement in me!
20 In the days of pandemic I suddenly became responsible for the life of the
other. My carelessness should not make another sick.
21 These days I keep learning why I should obey the rules. I begin to
understand why this containtment areas and red-sones; and I abide by
the restrictions imposed on me on account of that.
22 I learnt that technology is God’s gift to man to continue His creative
actions through man’s participation. These days everything is by ‘on
line’. Children learning by online, ordering food and grocery by online,
consulting the doctor by online, taking part in the marriage and burial by
online, religious services by online. Practically everything is ‘online’.
23 I am beginning to learn to live without luxuries and grand celebrations
of any sort as long as as this pandemic is in my air, because there is
someone in my neighbourhood who is hungry and half clad and I cannot
afford it.
