What happens when your evil dream comes true… #213

Lock-down Day 1 : 23rd March,2020

I remember the time I was in school and it was the time of our exams. Even though I was among the studious people, secretly I wished our exams to get cancelled for the most apocalyptic reasons.
“Dear God, can you not stop the exams in the middle? Maybe an earthquake or an unstoppable fire or somebody’s death. Do something but stop these exams…”
Almost 10 years back, I might have said this without realizing the how evil my wish was. The event that would have the potential to stop our exams in the middle would definitely be a dangerous one.

At present time, 2 of my cousins were writing their Higher Secondary Board Exams. It is the final exam of high-school, after which students seek different disciplines of studies -like doctors, engineers, lawyers and what not. Due to the pandemic caused by Covid-19, state Govt. decided to postpone the exams for a month. The students also had the entrance exams following Higher Secondary-which is for getting admissions in colleges for respective degrees.

I am currently staying at home with my family in Kolkata. I came to visit them a week back. I was supposed to go back to Hyderabad today but God had different plan. My city is under lock-down from today. So is the state of Hyderabad. After being advised the central Govt. many states went under complete or partial lock-down from today- no public transport would be available. Most of the stores are closed except medical stores and food shops.
All passengers trains were cancelled 2 days back, my flight was not cancelled but there was no way I could go to my place from airport.

Most of the IT companies are trying to provide Work from home facility to its employees in order to continue work. It was a difficult task indeed. Many of them do not have sufficient laptops, the staff appointed for packing the desktops of hundreds of employees in such a short notice are clueless. Many of my colleagues had to get their desktop packed in office and carry it to their home-towns. Most of the people live in hostels and paying guest facilities. In a situation where Govt. was about to shut every transport down, most of them had to rush to their places.

I too was supposed to collect my system today from a colleague of mine. However the lockdown changed everything. I am not sure when things will get better.
The domestic flights are still operational till 24th March. Even if the passengers are flying to a different city that is locked down I am not sure how they are going to reach their destination from the airport. People are thinking that I am “enjoying” my extended holidays but that’s not the case.

I am certainly grateful to God that I am with my family at the moment. It would have been much worse if I was in Hyderabad and stuck in the pg.
There was a quite a lot of work in my office now and I truly want to reduce the workload on my teammates’ shoulders. Also the uncertainty is topping everything now.

If I run out of the leaves, it would be a loss of pay which is the last that I would want.

If I were in school or college now, having my exams cancelled/postponed would have been great. But now as a working adult, I feel more responsible towards work, also the reason why this all happened- Covid-19.

Our world, everyone of us is in a tough time now. We could never foresee this, until it is here. Some people are terrified, some people are not even alert of the seriousness of the situation. There is lack of awareness in general public, the medical facilities are still very limited.
I just hope, everyone recovers and we all win over the pandemic.