‘HP Govt. has instructed all the schools and colleges to remain closed till 30th March 2020 in view of the rising threat of COVID-19’ [1]. 

Again a ‘normal day’ passed, and we strolled back to our hostels. As we were settling in our comfortable clothes, we received the above notification, which left us like a dog with two tails.

The past months had seen us emerging as phoenixes from the fire of final exams. While the news of Covid-19 had kept popping up in the background, we were too self-indulgent to care then. Still not realizing the gravity of the situation, we started planning for our ‘mini-vacation’ of 15 days taking home 2 pajamas, 2 T-shirts, and 2 books for a 2-week vacation.

“India will be under a Janata Curfew /Lockdown for 21 days,”says PM Modi [2].

A Piece of news that swept the floor beneath our feet. The COVID-19 cases started increasing, and so did the death toll. The hustle and bustle of the town were replaced by barren roads, deserted markets, and never experienced zone of deafening silence. 

Every item that arrived inside the house needs to be washed or sanitized and dealt with accordingly. Cleanliness was not just next to Godliness; our lives seemed dependent on it now.

A pinch of salt added bland to our lives by our Prime Minister with his ‘tasks’ for the general population to show our solidarity and support to the 

Corona Warriors

Acts like lighting candles, banging of ‘thaalis,’’ thus resonating the message that we are all together in this. 

The subsequent announcement of yet another lockdown made us realize that this will be a long-drawn battle for us. Words like social distancing, quarantine dominated everyone’s tongue.  The question that was somewhere enveloped between multiple layers of thought finally surfaced: What about our classes, attendance, exams?What about college?

For students having adequate attendance takes priority over everything else; hence, it started thee-journey of students in 2020.

In the beginning, we were simply asked to mark a “YES” on our WhatsApp class group after going through the PowerPoint presentations uploaded by the teachers as per schedule. Getting attendance had never been soeffortless that we could mark present with our eyes shut! To our dismay, our college staff soon came up with a new method. One had to wade through assignments with a strict deadline.  Phone calls from teachers were accompanied by an adrenaline rush and, surprisingly, a motivation (fear for some)   strong enough  to push us out of our comfort

zones and study. Eventually, apps like WebEx, Zoom, Google meet, which came as a panacea for the crisis are now the new paradigm in education. Soon enough, another problem surfaced: many students have no or sub-par internet connections, which makes it extremely difficult for them to attend these online classes regularly. 

Nevertheless, our mischievous brains came up with ideas of marking present in the chat box and leaving the meeting or simply keeping our phones aside during classes to do whatever we wish to Little did we know, our teachers would join hands with the computer operators and come up with antidotes for each of our plans, asking us to keep our cameras on, an abrupt roll-call, and questioning and submitting our tests via Google sheets.

As everything has its own drawbacks, these classes where we do not have anyone hounding us to stay on task makes it easier for us to procrastinate. Also now suddenly, the whole sea of knowledge in books was inaccessible. But, for people who don’t like to even put their feet in this sea of knowledge anyways, this lockdown made us realize the new options available nowadays for learning without even reading books.

Some apps and coaching institutes were already available that served such purposes. However, we keep getting sucked into browsing wormholes to find full PDF versions for books left behind in the hostel. 

Change is inevitable; growth is optional. The scope and reach of education broaden to horizons greater than perhaps ever imagined, empowering us with the opportunity to make this situation worthwhile. Yes, it hurts a little when we realize that the time that was supposed to be spent hanging out with friends, organizing college fests, most importantly, planning for the long-awaited ‘Final Year Goa Trip is now being spent at home attending online classes and practicing social distancing.

Though we have our way out still, there is nothing that can compensate for the actual physical company of friends. Sure, there has been a happy transition from the insipid mess food and worrying about laundry at the hostel to eating good food every hour of the day and wearing pajamas and T-shirts all day at home. Paradoxically it has made us feel homesick for a different home altogether.

Now, after six months, with colleges still being closed, our early burst of the joy of having so much time on our hands has fizzled out and turned into a genuine reason for stress. Our early twenties are being spent with not much to show. Where does a college student stand after colleges reopen after such a long gap is our constant concern and will remain so till the inevitable moment of truth arrives?

While we longingly wait, there is so much more we have taken to during this time. There is no definite way to work on our clinical skills, but nothing stops us from honing up our cooking skills and reading all the books that have been lying lonely on our shelves. So many of our peers have taken to regular yoga and exercising to deal with the stress of uncertainty that this time has brought.

We have been largely house-bound since March, surrounded by family but also with all the news about the pandemic and its squeal on everything in the world. All this time that we have had to spend with ourselves has obviously got us thinking about how important work is. We may curse it while we’re actually at it, but an idle mind can indeed become a devil’s workshop. Today ‘Health is wealth’ is not merely a platitude but something that time demands we constantly revisit in innovative ways.

As this is being written, India is rushing from lockdown to different stages of unlocking. Soon we will also get to back to our college routine, but in a rush to return to normal, we need to take time to consider which parts of the supposed normal are worth rushing back to.

1. India TV News. "Himachal Pradesh closes all schools, colleges, anganwadi centers till March 31 due to coronavirus threat." Available at: https://www.indiatvnews.com/news/india/himachal-pradesh-closes-all-schools-colleges-anganwadi-centers-till-march-31-due-to-coronavirus-threat-598055 (accessed on September 12, 2020).

2. Economic Times. "India will be under complete lockdown starting midnight: Narendra Modi." Available at: https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics-and-nation/india-will-be-under-complete-lockdown-starting-midnight-narendra-modi/articleshow/74796908.cms (accessed on September 15, 2020).