How are you? A simple question;
courteous at best, an indifferent conversation starter at worst. In pandemic
Covid-19, it’s a trigger for some soul-searching.
“Not the same anymore,” says Ashwini
Rataboli, a Panaji-based homemaker. She’s beset with fears that sons Soham, 16,
and Shlok, 11, will contract the virus if they step out of the house; worried
the same would happen if she goes for her brisk walk.
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Then she takes a deep breath and says,
“I will never take anything for granted again. Thoughts like people (I know)
will be always there or that I will always get what I want… my freedom,
happiness… I’ve learnt the value of everything. So now I try to see and do
everything, even if it’s mundane and routine, with love and joy. And I am so
grateful for all that we have, after all there are so many people in the world
who are struggling through this pandemic.”
The 44-year-old’s realisation is an
undercurrent flowing through much of Goan society throughout the state and even
the Diaspora connecting via social media.
“I am grateful I got to see my father
just before he passed away,” says Sydney-based John Dias. The 36-year-old got
back to his family in Australia just before borders closed while his
septuagenarian father succumbed to cancer at the family home in Panaji shortly
after India’s lockdown began.
On the seas off the coast of San
Francisco, Trevor Fernandes has started bonding with some of his “stranded
family” aboard the locked down cruise liner even as he connects with his own
family in Siolim via WhatsApp. “We’re all in this together and we have to be
there for each other. I feel very blessed,” says the 30-year-old.
In Margao, Mathew and Florrie D’Sa are
counting their blessings as fate brought their Mumbai-based daughter and family
to see them for a short holiday that is now a lockdown stay. With the
maid-cum-cook unable to come, Melanie helps her mother with the cooking while
husband Ryan and daughter Simran handle household chores, along with the D’Sa’s
youngest son, Melroy.
Apart from the family bonding that’s
underway, the presence of so many hands has made the effort of taking the
78-year-old patriarch for his thrice-weekly dialysis treatment a lot easier. “I
will miss them terribly when this lockdown is over,” says D’Sa
In Cavelossim, 50-year-old restaurateur
Cruz Cardozo says he’s been getting very worried. While he feels blessed that
his wife and teenage daughter are with him and that there’s fresh food and
drinks available, the constant media bombardment about new cases and deaths in
the pandemic has his spirits plummeting.
“A week ago I started going for a brisk
walk and the exercise is calming my mind and helping me focus on what is
important,” says the president of the Shack Owners Welfare Society. While
seeking government help for affected tourism stakeholders is a future course of
action, humaneness is an immediate priority—looking after the cooks, waiters,
security personnel etc stranded across Goa and ensuring they are able to return
to their homes when the lockdown ends.
Equally important is finding alternate
sources of sustenance through agriculture and pisciculture till the tourism
industry bounces back. “We can’t just sit back and demand external help alone,
we have to find our own ways out of this too,” he says.
Ranjiv Rataboli, who runs two factories,
agrees. “There’s no production going on but I still have to pay my 30-35
employees because they are dependent on me. Yes, we will approach the
government for help, but we have to do our bit too.”
To tackle the restlessness of his
stuck-at-home status, he’s taken to helping out in the house, cooking
occasionally to give the missus a break, and it’s his personal “challenge” to
ensure fresh food for his family. “It’s not as easy as it once was. I have to
think 10 times before stepping out of the house and when I return I have to
consciously remember to immediately have a bath and put my clothes to wash. A
slip up on my part can direly affect my family,” says the 49-year-old.
“These are testing times, especially for
couples,” says Miriam Sequeira a 32-year-old, mother-of-one. Giving her own
example, the psychologist with mental health NGO, Sangath, says she’s juggling
a lot more in this lockdown as work and home overlap and the external support
of a child care service is unavailable. To ease some of the load she has
temporarily shifted to her in-laws home in Carmona, while her husband, an
equally busy scribe, does a decent bit to help with their toddler son.
Offering a larger perspective, Sequeira
says, “The strain of this period is probably make or break time for many
couples, because the resentment built up (of not helping out or not helping out
enough) during this time will carry forward when the lockdown ends. It is very
important that couples talk to each other, discuss their issues and work things
out. It’s a time to be there for each other.”
While she counts her blessings and is
happy her son and his grandparents are bonding, she’s re-evaluating her own
priorities, hoping to take on lesser work so as to spend more quality time with
family.
Speaking of re-evaluation, Vailarose
Fernandes is re-evaluating her role as an educator. “It’s no longer possible to
take the teacher-student bond in a classroom environment for granted. Online
teaching methods have become the norm and yet we still have the responsibility
of guiding our young people, especially through these trying times,” says the
assistant professor of mass communication at St. Xavier’s College, Mapusa.
She’s been encouraging students to find ways to keep busy rather than give in
to anxiety, pushing them to enhance their own skills through networking,
freelance writing, etc.
Sequeira observes that many of those
below the age of 30 “appear to be having anxiety issues, not being able to
sleep, they seem to be giving in to collective anxiety”, even as those older,
and possibly more experienced at handling life’s trials, are “looking at things
more practically and are calmer”.
Ironically, an undesirable trait coming
from the older lot is Goa’s infamous crab mentality. Many of those spoken to in
this story highlighted how they have seen those wanting to help in their
villages and towns being judged by others on past antecedents. This has led to
creative solutions drying up as the hurt ones go into a shell.
It’s a time to rise above pettiness and
to work as a community for the community, is the common opinion expressed. They
also wish the government would get its act together, plan better and
communicate clearly, while politicians stop politicking.
It’s also a time to redefine the turning
to divinity, they opine.
“We all say our individual prayers after
bath before our little temple at home, but now, along with the mantras and our
individual desires we are also praying for the world, for people affected and
for this pandemic to go away,” says Ashwini.
Two, wishing not to be identified, point
out that with structured forms of religious worship also under lockdown, people
are connecting to God in a more spiritual manner. “Whether this translates to
people leaving organised religion altogether or gravitating to it more is to be
seen. But realising that we are not in control and that there is a higher being
and a deeper purpose to our existence is definitely in the air,” says one.
Florrie D’Sa, 75, offers eternal advice,
“Whether there is a virus or not, you have to teach yourself to take one moment
at a time and to be completely in that moment. It is pointless worrying. This
is a test from God and we’ll take each test as it comes, with his blessings of
course.”
On Easter Day, this is the best advice
we could have got, and should follow.
