A Tale of Two Lockdowns

There will be a deluge of think pieces and personal reflections on the year that I think we all want a refund for, and this post is no different.

The first-quarter lockdown found me marooned in a mountain villa, contemplating the loss of the job that had brought me to this country and the twin challenges of maintaining legal status and finding a new place to live, with the only road down to town barred, and trying to cope with the overwhelming mental stress that eventually pushed me to seek help. (The hotline worked.)

I was surrounded by nature though – there were frequent wildlife visits (the highlight of which was a young douc langur peering  through my bedroom window) and long forest hikes and beaches and waterfalls. I spent my remaining days on the mountain baking banana bread and chocolate-chip cookies and strawberry muffins, while trying to perfect Dalgona coffee – I never did – day drinking Chilean chardonnay and getting increasingly enraged at the buffoonery and bellendery on display back in the bad ol’ PI. 

That lockdown was followed by a briefly wonderful window of seeming normalcy, with diving and road trips and birthday celebrations and restaurants and seaside weekends, that breezy feeling like things could go back to what they were before. Poor sweet summer child! Should have known it wouldn’t last and not all of it was real because 2020 likes to twist the knife in. And slap you in the face for good measure.

I spent the third-quarter lockdown in town, taking daily video calls in a comfortable apartment that I was able to afford with a new job – yay – and living in town meant: dealing with the corresponding police visit at midnight (they were polite and I was legal so that was that); and participating in the free citywide Covid-19 testing.

I kept my trio of plants alive and my sanity intact with furtive (allowed) walks around the neighbourhood for groceries. The only wildlife now were the birds, but I was still surrounded by trees. And I kept up my acquaintance with my kitchen – sometimes it would be shakshuka and chicken parmigiana and quiche made from scratch; other days it would be pancakes for dinner because I couldn’t be bothered. I turned to day drinking gin and tonics, especially useful for sedating oneself against the daily clown show back home. And in the weeks I needed distraction the most, we were blessed with a surprise Taylor Swift album. 

So what was the downside to this second one? Only the emotional devastation wreckage distress that produced this post and ambient anxiety about being hemmed in by an invisible virus.

During a year of giving up control over events and letting go of plans, I finally accepted that it is okay to admit you’re not okay, and there’s no shame in seeking help. There are good days and there are bad days – sometimes plenty of bad days, one after another – and it is enough to make it through them, one day at a time. 

And yet. 

My family, bless their souls, kept themselves safe, even welcoming a daughter-in-law into the fold. My Tier 1 friends remained little pinpoints of light scattered across several timezones. While I was only able to squeeze in two quick trips abroad before the world shut down – one to the homeland for Lunar New Year at my mother’s insistence, and the other a weekend in Myanmar – it meant I also got to visit a few more places here: Hue, Cham islands, Tam Ky, Quy Nhon for my birthday (aboard a luxury train with free-flowing wine to dull the sting of a lonely nameday) and Hanoi for Christmas. 

And on the very last day of the year, I had coffee by the river, called my folks who were all dressed in Pantone-approved illuminating yellow for media noche, cooked dinner to the second surprise Taylor album (!), watched some Star Trek, put on an apricot face mask, lit a candle and went to bed well before midnight. I woke up in 2021 to messages from my other set of parents in Turin and the Christmas presents I’d put off opening. 

No matter how we got ourselves over the line, we’re here, alive and healthy and standing squarely in a new year and so I would chalk the overall result up as a win. Barely, but a win nevertheless.

Long story short, I survived. And so did you.