Thinking back two years, we couldn’t possibly have predicted the sequence of events as they unfolded over the course of time. We had thought COVID would be a matter of a few weeks, months at most. We certainly did not imagine how it could come back and bite us in the *ss over a year later with the second wave; after the government had misguidedly and prematurely announced victory of the pandemic. Two years later, Janta Curfew resonates with people – it was the thing that got the ball rolling. #JantaCurfew was trending then, it is trending now:
The empty roads, the absence of traffic noise and the clear, unpolluted, breathable air… it was eerie and wonderful all at the same time.
Remember all the feel-good stories about the return of dolphins and wildlife on the streets?
We found new ways to work and we realised what all was possible to do without leaving home.
A lot of us put on a lot of weight – suddenly we were bored enough to be cooking more, with no way to work it all off.
Many introverts were delighted they could just stay at home and not interact with others. ‘Normal’ is perhaps less appealing now.
If anyone was not negatively impacted by the lockdown, this was merely a measure of their privilege. For people living on the margins of society, this was the start of a nightmare: penury, joblessness, and no food, no means to get home which could be hundreds if not thousands of km away.
In retrospect these forcefully coercive measures were perhaps not warranted.
I remember I was taking a nap when I was woken up by a violent cacophony of people banging on anything and everything that could produce sound.
We saw and heard this sort of thing everywhere – they were doing it in Italy so why not India.
After the taali thaali bajao event people rushed out into the streets – promptly defeating the purpose of the exercise and completely oblivious to the concept of social distancing. Idiotic behavior through the pandemic gave us all a new COVID lexicon.
It was the second anniversary
We saw some moments of extreme, rather violent enthusiasm.
We were going to eradicate the coronavirus.
Two years on, we are a whole lot wiser - at least wiser than this guy.
On the second anniversary of #JantaCurfew people recalled how what followed was very different from what we expected.
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