Day 2: March 23, 2020

I was jolted awake by the sharp sting of a wasp on my pillow. Barely three hours had passed since I had fallen asleep, my eyes having fought their lids amidst the excitement of posting back-to-back blogs. When I woke up, it all seemed like a dream and I was right back in Bombay Mumbai. It took four more hours of determined sleeping before I emerged again in sunny Mysuru.

My sister was due to arrive in the evening, which meant one risky venture outdoors. From walking through the crowds of Mumbai two days ago to now fearing one trip across a deserted Mysuru, I could hardly process the massive shift. To top it all, it was now upon me to convince my dad to avoid venturing out even with all his promised precautions and ensure I made the trip to the airport alone.

Buzzing from the response to my last two blogs, I was all pumped about cooking dinner tonight. Success should follow success and my cooking prowess should reach the next level by Day 2, yeah? It looked like I had learnt nothing from 2020 even as an eventful March – following an equally eventful January and February – was drawing to a close.

Keeping in mind the chickpeas Mom had soaked in the morning, I had nothing but Chole – Chawal (Chickpeas curry and rice) on my mind for dinner. Having found the perfect recipe that promised a dish reminiscent of the streets of old Delhi, my plan was all set. All the ingredients were in place and every step was prepared for in advance. I have always found patience to be a virtue, but today, as I let the chickpeas sit in the cooker without a whistle for a good 45 minutes it seemed I still had a lot to pick up if my family was to place its bets on my culinary contribution. The dish was not what I expected it to be, but to have salvaged it after what could have been was good enough for the day.

As soon as the stove was off, I left to pick my sister from the airport. Just as she was about to hop in the back (the least we could do for social distancing) we were approached by a lady and a man who appeared to be her son. She was wearing a mask, he was not. They asked us if we could drop them to their destination, or at least the main road, which was essentially deserted. Their destination was quite some way off from our house and even though every inch of me wanted to say yes as always, I had no doubt in my mind as to what I was going to tell them.

I’d go back to my thoughts from yesterday, where I wondered about where we stop thinking about the community and start thinking about ourselves. At that point, I wasn’t even worried about being infected myself, but that I would potentially be carrying this home with me. Alternatively, either of us could be carrying a dormant virus and risk passing it on to either of them. I could see my sister – a natural at hospitality and charity – stuck in the same dilemma. While I knew leaving them behind was not the best thing we could have done, we were simply not ready to take the chance and cause undue harm to our parents, who had stayed home at my insistence to avoid precisely the kind of interaction that now stared us in the face.

Of course, there was also a part of me that had left the house prepared to avoid interacting with a single being aside from my sister, regardless of the circumstances. For someone who’s always willing to help another in need, it looks like I’m going to face tougher questions throughout this pandemic on the limits to my courtesy and ostensible good will. Today, a line was drawn, but the question remains as to what was it exactly that prompted me to do so. Additionally, each person is motivated by a unique combination of factors, so is it really possible to expect humanity as a whole to come together and save the community simply because it’s our social responsibility to do so? As cases continue to rise around the world, at what point will the majority understand why exactly we’re taking the steps we are and would it be of any use then? It looks now like we’re in for the long haul and hopefully time will answer these questions. The best we can do for now, is sit back in quarantine and see what we can do better for ourselves and those around us. And if we can’t, let’s at least learn to take the best care of ourselves. It’s a good place to start, if nothing else.

You can read my quarantine series from the introduction here and my record of Day 1 here.