Choking times. One year in the pandemic. A few personal words
On March 11, 2020, the coronavirus outbreak was officially declared a pandemic. Hence, today marks one year since COVID-19 changed all our lives.
It’s funny to reflect now that this was our last “normal” week one year ago, and most of us had no idea what was ahead of us. Ever since then, it’s been pretty rough. Especially for us living abroad. We felt disconnected and confused and constantly scrutinized whether it was the right decision to stay over 6000 miles away from home.
And you know, I’ve been choked on my words for the longest time. Travel is my passion (and a big part of my job in that matter), and without it, the past year has brought an enormous identity crisis. My life looks a lot different now than a year ago and almost contradictory to what we had planned once we decided to make the move to Singapore. The recent times have been heavy, but especially since my daily life seems redundant compared with significant events occurring around the globe, I often find I don’t want to share anything at all.
For the greater part of the last year, I was driven by hope, though. Maybe it was also desperation. I was constantly checking the news for updates on travel bans, not only for leisure travel but mostly for the ability to go home at one point. With the year’s change, I’ve stopped that for my own sanity. We had secretly set Christmastime as our goal to leave for good if we wouldn’t be able to see our friends and families otherwise. Well, that was three months ago. And guess what, we’re still here. And as it turns out, we might stay as well.
Things will look different here while we tarry home and wait for travel to be safe again. I hope you stay with me through these experiences and bear with me that I won’t always find the creativity or the right words to describe these uncertain times.
But you know what, after the rain comes the sunshine. That’s the circle of life, how it’s always been. And once’s for sure, there is a lot of sun where I live, so I will try to transport as much warmth I can for you.
Stay safe everyone–we got this together.
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