WHEN IN MANCHESTER
Thoughts on being far from home during COVID-19 pandemic
I am writing this not to seek pity nor attention. I am writing because I want to give myself closure by letting out the distress I feel inside.
I laugh at how uncoordinated my family speaks when we’re all having our routine video calls. Here we go again, Nini asking a question to a topic we stopped talking about 5 minutes ago.
It’s weird thinking how on Earth I got myself into studying a masters degree in the UK at this time and at a young age all by myself. Yet this has always been what I have wanted. I always say to myself that there is always a reason for everything, albeit not as logical as we’d expect or perhaps the reason surfaces not at a time that we’d like it to, though perhaps that is just my personal positivist contemplation. Everyone is doing the same now I guess. Truly no one ever thought at even a the start of this year that the world would stop, turn upside down and lock itself shut because of a deadly virus within days.
Currently, I am in Manchester, United Kingdom. The toll for positive Covid-19 cases here has peaked just under 15,000 and has taken the lives of 760 people (I put off writing this piece for 2 weeks, the updated statistics in UK per 11th of April has reached nearly 80,000 confirmed cases and nearly 10,000 deaths). Though Manchester is still one of the lucky ones. I am safe, I have stocked a few weeks supply of food, I have been taking my vitamins regularly. My internet connection is more than sufficient for online classes, watching Netflix and doing video calls without much hassle. I keep check of the things I do and the things I should be looking forward to in the next few weeks to keep on top of things.
Yet day and night I feel strained and hopeless and confused. I find my eyes gazing outside my window, body turned out to soak in the sunlight, but my mind is elsewhere. Back in Indonesia, as in elsewhere in the world, lives are deteriorating by the hour. With a 6-hour time difference, I dread waking up in the morning thinking something horrible has happened back home.
Are Nini and Aki okay and eating well?
There are insufficient hospital beds, carers in the front line without proper protective gear, and minimum protection for those who still have to risk their lives by going out to work in order to live.
I hope Mamah and Papah are not fighting again.
Jakarta, as of early April has (finally) started implementing stringent lockdown measures with other big cities in Java to follow suit. I hopelessly thought that there was no use in provinces and municipalities locking up their borders when Jakarta, as the epicenter for jobs in Indonesia and also the epicenter of the virus outbreak, won’t close its borders for homecoming.
Damn, my brothers better stop their whining about the WiFi or that they’re bored all the time. Can’t they see how this is pressuring Mamah and Papah too?
People in big cities in Indonesia still go about their daily lives as many do not have the luxury of working from home. The government is trying to reallocate budget towards the pandemic relief in the form of draconian social protection policies helping to cushion families and companies from the dreaded financial aftermath of the pandemic. It’s progress.
I woke up to say goodbye to the passing of my aunt and uncle. I hope Papah is coping well…
People in the UK are also hitting the streets as temperatures rise and flowers bloom. It’s also kind of daunting to see so many people on the streets, especially seeing young people meeting up in the park.
Aww look at Sarabi’s little kitties! And Susi the bunny! How fast are they growing up! Didn’t realise one of the hens had died.*
But people are entitled to one outing a day, that is strictly for shopping or exercising. Some areas have even started prosecuting people going outside with no clear and essential reason. For a liberal country, this is a huge infringement to people’s rights and some people are taking this very harshly. Guess there is a limit to individual freedom at a time of pandemic as this. But there also must be a limit to this pandemic too, right?
Been reading the same materials for the past few weeks and I still have no clue. On top of that, I have so many other assignments I need to focus.
Come on, focus.
Oh wait, Mum and Nini are video calling again…
*I wanted to add an additional reference to this one. I left behind Papah’s many pets at home: a young and fabulous cat named Sarabi, after Simba’s really pretty mum; Sarabi’s cute offspring kitties called Pini, Pidi, Pici; a lonely rabbit that plays with cats and chickens and birds named Susi, after the badass minister; a hen that doesn’t really have a name; and a parrot that I’d often annoy when doing the laundry upstairs. We’ll be reunited after this!
