Priorities in a post-pandemic world

A man exercises at Shivaji Park in Dadar amid a relaxed lockdown. Pic/ Ashish Raje

I feel mortal in a way I haven-t before. I reconciled myself to the idea of passing away a few years ago because I suppose that happens to everyone after a certain age. This time though, it felt more immediate, as if those final moments could arrive without warning over a weekend.

We have all approached life with COVID-19 differently, based entirely upon how vulnerable the places we live in have been. I am far from a hotspot, but the virus is always on my mind when I step out for groceries or enter an elevator. Everyone talks about how the world has changed, and how everything from eating out to flying will never be the same, but I have been thinking a lot about what I want to change for myself if I manage to get through this alive.

I sometimes spend my nights in lockdown looking at what friends, family members and complete strangers have to say online. I have no presence on social media, which was a conscious decision made a couple of years ago, but those status updates slide into my WhatsApp groups nonetheless, reminding me that most of us continue to obsess about the wrong things.

Bigotry, for instance, doesn-t seem to have taken a beating. I am no longer friends with anyone who expresses hate towards another person based on religious beliefs. It hasn-t stopped these former friends of mine from continuing their baseless attacks even as the world struggles with bigger crises. What does it take, I wonder, for someone to look inside themselves and question the beliefs they have been indoctrinated with? If a pandemic and the risk of death it brings isn-t enough to change how we look at human life, is there hope for the future?

A pandemic didn-t stop Indians from attacking poor migrants who had been abandoned by their government and forced to fend for themselves. Those who couldn-t help or remedy the situation in any way didn-t have a problem with blaming those hungry men and women either. We have all been exposed to a virus that doesn-t discriminate between rich and poor, but that didn-t erase the disdain we carry within ourselves for anyone who doesn-t earn as much money as we do.

What those endless images of India-s poor walking hundreds of kilometres towards uncertain futures at home taught me was how incredibly privileged I am. The act of sitting in a safe place, staring into a laptop, and typing out what I feel is almost one of shame. It has made me question everything I thought I wanted to work towards.

Many believe we will slip into our old ways the minute a vaccine is found. Sceptics say the environmental benefits we have accrued by staying indoors will vanish within months as cars and international travel boost pollution levels again. Maybe that will happen. Corporate life may change, but not in ways significant enough to benefit the vulnerable or correct salary imbalances. I hope to be able to focus on myself though and prevent the world from forcing me down a path I no longer wish to travel. I also hope my family and friends manage to change how they interact with the world, even if the world eventually goes right back to how it was before the virus appeared.

Indians are often referred to as the most racist people on Earth. It is a viable accusation, given the prejudices thrust upon us all when we are children, and the biases we constantly carry against anyone who doesn-t dress like us, speak like us, eat or pray as we do. I hope, in a futile, childish way, that we manage to erase at least a small portion of that hate within us. It is in the best interests of our government that we do not because hate leads to votes, but a personal attempt to be nicer to everyone we know may count for something.

Someone I know recently lamented that the India she grew up in no longer existed because the way we once shared each other-s homes and festivals is no longer permitted. We have been actively encouraged to pit ourselves against our neighbours, and we alone have the power to remedy that. For myself, I have decided to focus on things I like, rather than the goals my parents set for us. A bigger house, a better automobile, or a higher salary may have been important once. It no longer is.

When he isn-t ranting about all things Mumbai, Lindsay Pereira can be almost sweet. He tweets @lindsaypereira
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The views expressed in this column are the individual-s and don-t represent those of the paper

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