Life | Joy

How To Seek Leisure, During The Pandemic

Riku Arikiri
ILLUMINATION
8 min readJul 23, 2020

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Photo by Tyler Nix on Unsplash

In times of COVID-19, it has become harder to connect with other people. Following the SOPs and the hysteria that follows has made it hard to seek friends especially for those who found it difficult to make friends in the first place.

Social distancing has become the norm, where you have to stand 6 feet apart for each other’s safety and that has also removed the fundamental opportunity of small-time conversations — the little moments that can define the basis of friendship between two people, strangers et. al.

For me, I have been at my home for the past 6 months. Though I was able to meet a few people in between but haven’t strolled out of my home only for morning walks when the parks are deserted or the evenings when the sun is sinking.

It has become harder for people to connect. I have experienced many people becoming distant during this crisis. Some have left the chat for good. “Why is this perhaps happening now, when we need to be closer to one another more than ever?” is something I often ponder.

Though I have been in contact with my friends all over the world. I often contact them every day, even though It’s just me sharing cute cat videos. That makes their day or night whenever they watch it.

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Riku Arikiri
ILLUMINATION

It’s never black or white. Sometimes there’s a bit of spicy red in there as well.