O Corona! Why Corona?

Till a few months ago, one could have had imagined different kinds of life, a happy life, a successful life, a gloomy life et cetera, but almost none of us would have ever thought that we'll get to experience something known as “Quarantine life" first hand. It was the month of March 2020, ten days after WHO declared the Coronavirus outbreak as a global pandemic, the Government of India decided to implement a nationwide lockdown for the first time in the country. Like most of the people ‘lockdown' was a term not very familiar to me and I had no clues that it is going to stay with me for longer time than my ex did. At that time and still while writing this, I'm an aspirant of the prestigious joint engineering entrance exams which are held in India for entrance to the renowned IIT's, my exams were scheduled to be held in April but due to this pandemic it is now stuck in the viscous cycle of postponement. No, no, this is not the time you leave reading this, trust me the boring and informational part is now done and we are moving towards the bittersweet memories of the quarantine. Telling you about JEE exam was important because that's what took me to the educational city of Kota which is unfortunately, infamously, the suicide capital of India as well, but don't go by the popular notion, it is not what it might seem in the first look. It is a happening city with more than 200 thousand students of same age group and all them preparing for undergraduate college admissions. Coming back to where we left, march 2020, I was in Kota alone, away from family in a hostel room and then I came to know that a lockdown has been imposed for 21 days and my exams are postponed. Initially the happiness of postponement of exam overshadowed the burdens caused by lockdown restrictions and my quarantine life began. The first few weeks passed in debates with friends, Is Covid-19 a biological war? Is Covid-19 the end of the world? Will our exams be canceled? Will we get to see the T-20 world cup this winter? And many such random issues used to be the central part of the discussions. These gossips helped me enter the month of April, it was now that I started to realize that this postponement of exam has come at the cost of my freedom. April passed slower than usual with poor quality mess food, with waiting for a smartphone which I had ordered because I had a basic keypad phone which made it even tougher to spend time in quarantine and with a desperate desire to go back to home. The month of May came with a duality of hope and despair. It was the month in which other states of the country decided to lift their students out of Kota, through buses, railways, flights. But my state, Bihar was of the opinion that it's unsafe to bring back students during this pandemic. Amongst such a scenario seeing your friends packing there bags, going back to there home state is a tough site and the cunning smile which they did pass, while going just added to it. The population of Kota now reduced from 200 thousand students to 30 thousand students, all from one state of India – Bihar. This was by far the toughest part of the quarantine time, frustration and anxiety became the central emotion of stranded students like us. What drives you up, also pulls you down sometimes, if it is not ethical in nature. This is what exactly happened with the Govt. Of Bihar, it faced a lot of criticism and protest by students and their parents. The central govt. decided to interfere and help the evacuation of stranded students and finally the govt. Of Bihar promised trains to bring the students back to home. This decision was welcomed by me and my friends with a little celebration and for the first time I became a cook and prepared egg curry for 3 of us in the hostel. After a fortnight or so, it was finally our turn to pack bags up, book a cab to the railway station, say goodbye to Kota and get welcomed by home. Usually the journey from Kota to Patna takes 2 days but it was a special non-stop train so it bought us back home in 14 hours only. The evacuation process became possible only because of the real life heroes, the Government, Kota administration, Coaching staff of Kota, Bihar administration, Railway staff. The applause which students gave to them from train when the train started, still gives me goosebumps in a very positive manner. Well, once I got back home, for first few days, I received lot of attention from them, also my hand carried a stamp which said “home quarantined" for 21 days. Those 21 days were spent reading, writing, playing music and reviving all those hobbies. This was my story of quarantine life, which taught me a lot of things, the most important being that, with every adversity or crisis comes a greater opportunity, it is on us whether to become cynical and give up hope or to adhere to larger call. It is like, if we know how to ride a horse we enjoy when the horse runs but if we don't know, the horse will enjoy at our cost.

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