Learn and Unlearn in Time of Quarantine
Three weeks ago, I came down with a terrible cold. It started with a few sneezes, coughs and an itchy, runny nose, though without a fever. I didn’t feel too ill to the point that I skipped classes. I remember showing up at school and joking to my friends, ‘yeah I’m probably the second or third confirmed case of coronavirus in New York.” I told myself, ‘it truly is the worst time to be Asian and get sick right now.’
Fast forward to today, more than 21,000 people have been infected with the virus in the city. Lives of millions of people around the globe have been turned upside down. What might seem like a harmless joke has become a pandemic, shaking the economy worldwide and mankind as a whole.
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Like everyone else in the world and especially in New York, I’ve been staying home. I used to complain that life in this city moves too fast, sometimes I just wanted it to slow down. So be careful what you wish for, in only a few short-but-feels-like-a-year weeks, I’ve witnessed this city transform into something so extraordinary.
During the last two weeks of social distancing, I’ve experienced frustration, stress, anger, joy, grief, nostalgia, anxiety, relief — all sorts of human emotions.
As a budding journalist I feel the urge to put something out there to share my perspective with others, hoping that it could benefit someone, anyone really. Most of these things are so minute compared to the bigger problems out there but in chaotic times like this, I want to share my two cents about what I’ve learned and unlearned while this crisis is still unraveling. For my own sanity, at least.
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What matters to me most has been and always be my family.
I think the very first moment I felt like this virus had a direct impact on me was when my sister, a sophomore at Mount Holyoke, was asked to leave campus for the rest of this semester. For international students, this means they will have to go back to their home country, and in our case, risking 25-hour trip to return to Vietnam.
If you read my blog about family then you know that I’m closest to my sister in the family. So when she was put in such a precarious situation, I felt helpless in a sense that I couldn’t be there for her, physically, or to try to figure things out with her in person. My mom’s worries went through the roof; she called my sister every ten minutes or so, leaving her in a more vulnerable state than she already was.
She was able to book her flights from Boston to Hanoi, with a layover in Doha. But only when she showed up at the check-in counter at Logan Airport, and only 15 minutes after she checked in, did the airlines tell her all the flights were cancelled. I got on the phone with her right away to talk through some options. She made it clear that she didn’t want to stay in the U.S., she just wanted to go home, home home. And I respect that.
Her first searches of other routes to go back to Hanoi wasn’t successful, so I chimed in and tried to book the flights for her. I tend to say I’m a cheap ass and the most frugal person ever but I’ve never spent more than $800 without blinking twice like when I saw the flights through Tokyo were still available. I learned that I’m able to overstep personal boundaries for my beloved ones and to make split-second decisions when needed (literally because everyone else was looking at the same flights).
During this time of isolation, I’ve found myself more grounded. I’ve spent more time speaking on the phone and on video with my parents and grandparents. I had to unlearn my emotional distance from them and learn that if the world does end, they are the only people who care deeply and unconditionally about me. And I also feel the same toward them.
Shared loneliness makes us seek out for one another’s company, whether it’s online.
I’m a big fan of seeing in people face to face, so now that everything’s going virtual, I learned that no matter who you are, an introvert, ambivert or extrovert, we all need to interact to survive. Isolation is nice… for maybe a week, before things go south.
I think humans are intrinsically drawn to others because as a species, we rely on each other in this evolution. We’re in solidarity to battle this virus, but we’re also together in terms of head space. I’ve found myself talking to friends I haven’t spoken to in a long time, maybe years. Listening to how everyone is handling this catastrophe has been eye-opening for me.
I particularly admire my creative friends who are making art all day and every day, whether through sculptures, music or food. I finally caved in to TikTok (I’m a true Gen Z now!), although I’m just a passive consumer not an active creator on the platform. I’ve gone back to watching Orange is the New Black and started watching Tiger King lol. I’ve had more time to read for leisure, more time to practice the guitar and most importantly, more time to evaluate my priorities in life.
Don’t we all at some point wish that we had more time to reflect?
Starting to date someone on the eve of a historic outbreak is a terrible-but-manageable idea.
There you have it. I know I’ve said many times that I had lost hope on romance cause people be treating me like trash but well, well, well — I spoke too soon.
The world is not the only thing that’s gone insane at this moment, my heart has, too. There’s this guy (no nickname needed because there’s just one ❤) whom I started seeing in late February. Little did we know when we decided to be together that we would have to rethink how our relationship could work in this once-in-a-lifetime situation.
Although we live in different boroughs, him in Manhattan and me in Queens, we’re technically in the same city. Before NYC Pause, our dates usually lasted for 24–48 hours at a time, weird I know, but for some reason it just worked out like that. Now we’ve been seeing each other on Messenger Video (not even FaceTime because someone is an Android user). LDR people, I hear you, you’ve been doing this before virtual dates are ubiquitous, but still! This sucks!
We’ve been crafting these potentially extreme scenarios in our heads: either not seeing each other for an indefinite amount of time, or being physically together 24/7 by staying in the same household. We’re still new to each other so we don’t want to jump the gun for fear of things falling apart, but at the same time, we just want to be together…
Ugh, but to look on the bright side, my babe told me, “desperate times call for romantic gestures,” so I guess side by side, we’re gonna pull through this rough start, so when we look back later, we will be more appreciative of the fun, outdoor things we get to do with each other. Until then, I hope he keeps reading me poems before bed and we keep day-dreaming about what we can do together when the apocalypse ceases.
Normalcy is a luxury we all take for granted.
I’m in no way revolutionary for saying this, but I think it’s important to keep this in mind not just as we manage to get by one day at a time, but also when this is all over. Who would have thought me putting on eyeliner and eyebrows could make me feel more mentally active? Who would have thought I would actually miss the swarm of people trying to get on the Queens-bound 7 train at Grand Central every evening? Who would have thought the prospect of doomsday makes my crazy roommate stop eating my food without asking and freeing up space in the fridge so her other three roomies can store stuff too?Who would have thought the 99-cent store across the street closing down would upset me greatly because I dearly miss its kind Chinese owners? Who would have thought the city that never sleeps might actually drowse off?
Many have compared what’s going on in New York right now to what happened after 9/11. Is it odd if I say I feel very honored to be going through this historic time in one of the most helter-skelter places on Earth right now? The existing abundance of me-time made me realize every strong emotion I’ve ever had is temporary and relative. We’re in a state of perpetual uncertainty and times even got darker because we have no clue when it will get better.
But…if my logic applies here, we’re all trapped in a certain set of emotions that might or might not drive us crazy, so we do anything within limits to try to appease them. I’ve been dwelling on all kinds of negative ideas until yesterday when..I don’t know, out of nowhere I felt this rush of optimism down my spine, as I questioned myself, what if I’ve reached the acceptance stage of it all? What if this is just reality now that we have to deal with? What if I’m just shifting my routine into a new rhythm where I can grow in a way I’ve never considered? What if we just carry on with the assumption that this is it?
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Since we’re bombarded by (and sometimes spoon-fed with) disheartening news all the time, I think my thoughts about the current climate could be easier to read. We have so much time to kill now, don’t we?
