‘QUARANTINED’ : Coronavirus Pandemic from a Child’s Perspective

I was quarantined inside the womb for 9 months and now I face another quarantine in this world. My name is Ved and I am eleven months old. I have gone out of my house hardly thrice. Corona you have locked up a happy social baby!!  My Nani says this is a long, strange interlude when the world has been interrupted. It will become normal soon.

As I grow up I do not want to recoil from a firm handshake, would love to play in the mud, touch my face a hundred times, and I do not want to wash my hands every hour, I want to lick them instead like any normal baby. I don’t want to be a hygiene freak and warily eye people around me as vectors of fear and contagion. I want to prevent falling down rabbit holes filled with anxiety-spiking news. I am too small for this!!

I would not want full or even a partial ‘homeschooling’. I would want to be with the kids of my age group as adults can be a very boring company. By the way, can someone let me know if suspensions and expulsions still apply in schools? And did the high schoolers of this year get a chance to go for prom and dance for a few hours? Or did they miss that ‘rite of passage’? I want to sit in a yellow school bus with the other kids and scream ‘BUS BUDDY’ when another Yellow bus passes by.  

My 5-year-old sister was not too happy to stay at home during the summer vacation. She says Corona is a monster that has encircled the world with its big tail and it is making the people gasp for breath. Even the sun, moon, and the stars are crying.  She says that there is a potion called ‘Sanitisers’ that will protect us from this monster. We need to wear our masks while going out to scare this monster and chase him away.

I often wonder about the word ‘Patriotism’. Dictionaries need to change the meaning of this word and redefine it. In this COVID world, real patriotism is recognising the great work of the front line workers like doctors, nurses, pharmacists, teachers, caregivers, store clerks, utility workers. Why should we build statues of only the political leaders? Why can’t we build statues of these frontline heroes and have public holidays dedicated to them? I would want to shower flower petals on them and applaud them. Nationalism and patriotism are more about building health, education, and the good life of your country. It does not mean attacking, destroying, bombing, and blowing up someone else’s country.

I would love to see airplanes flying high up in the blue sky. Would love to experience a visit to a zoo, park, restaurant, or a mall, eat ice-creams … would want to splash in a swimming pool, play soccer, go on a hike, have sunset picnics at a beach. My list is endless… and till then I look out of my window… THE WORLD LOOKS BRAND NEW TO ME…

Pranita Lele

Educationist & Columnist