Pramila Karki / Avinash Chandra

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) outbreak which is caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), that started around December 2019, has now become a worldwide disaster and the death toll as of today (27th June 2020) has reached 497,553 and counting.
This cruel side of the pandemic had not only stunned the mankind, but it has also brought innumerable negativities in our life. The economic recession, untimely demise of loved ones, uncertainty of future and so on and so forth has been so overwhelming that we have been soaked up with the negativities of the pandemic.

Positives
However, there is some positivity attached that we also need to see and get happy and satisfied with what has been brought to our life. Here, we have tried to show the positive aspect of COVID pandemic lockdown that we need to see and stay positive!
Since we have been fighting our invisible enemy, we have started doing many positive things that were largely ignored. So, may be this COVID pandemic came to balance our lifestyle, relationship, our surrounding, Mother Nature and our universe itself !
Let us start with the cleansing part. Imagine how we were ignorant of cleaning our body that the World Health Organization (WHO) and other public health communities teaching us how to wash our hands how clean ourselves!
We used to clean ourselves, but never did we know or perform the cleansing activities for each time we touched doorknobs or other public things or come close to persons. Now we not only actively sanitise or disinfect ourselves but also those things that directly or indirectly belong to us.
The cleansing part is now well accepted and regularly exercised by us even no celebrations or occasions are nearby. Never did we pay attention that simple soap water can be as effective as or more effective than the expensive fancy looking fragrant sanitisers.
Control in expenses and impulse buying. With the COVID lockdown, the income has down stepped rapidly, the economic recession has crippled life. Even simple things have become precious. We are now looking for the ways to extend the usage of same thing rather than changing them or buying new unless necessary. We now avoid going outside and thus the expenses on outing or other expenses are substantially curtailed. Hanging of new clothes on wardrobe has substantially decreased and we are happy using same old clothes.

Quality Time With Family
The pandemic has given us an opportunity to spend quality time with the family. Before COVID a typical family routing was get up in the morning, eat something if possible, go to work, finish work, go to collect child, comeback to home and squeeze whole day love in 1 hour of meeting with family members and then bedtime. During this lockdown period we are not only able to cutdown the chances of spread of infection by staying inside home, but also, we have fortunately been able to spend our great time with our beloved ones.
With parents working from home (possibly) and kids not having to go to school while grandparents having not much able to gather other friends or go to the ‘chowks’ this is the best time to bond as a family. More positive side is that as parents get involved in home-schooling, they start to understand what their kids are ‘actually’ learning in school and what difficulties do they face and find the best ways to help them. ‘Babysitting’ has been easier and more fun these days since grand parents, parents are all together in home.
The fun and feeling of togetherness are a best way of relieving stress that had been there from the ages to us and improve mental health. Improving cooking/baking skills. The once arduous task has become a fun work in the family. Less outing, lesser opened restaurants even fewer takeaways and more time at home has given us an ample opportunity to try new things in cooking and enhance skill.
New cooking methods, newer ingredients as well as easy guidance from elderly or from internet has given us opportunity to enhance our skill eat more good taste of our own hand! Eating a bit healthier.

Cooking At Home
Home cooked and or self-cooked rather than bought readymade food are healthier undoubtedly. The fast food, impulse snack purchases are significantly curtailed and so is the junk food. With time, now we are more cautious about food we eat and nutrition we get. Keeping this in mind, I with the help of Boddhisatva Vihar, a humanitarian organization, have successfully been able to distribute the healthy food more than two lakhs plates to the needy persons.
Workouts and getting in shapes. The availability of extra time and more stay at home and hence worry of gaining weight has prompted many among us to start workouts at home. From Yoga to energetic Zumba to Gym people are getting creative with their home workouts. With domestic help also needing to stay home, we find ourselves to do our own household stuff. Despite having to do the household work, we find several positive aspects attached with it. Housework is one of the most productive ways to keep busy and not bored. We are personally invested while cleaning our own home and so we do a much better and honest job.
Sweeping, mopping, dusting, and cleaning cobwebs are all ways to keep active and burn extra calories as well as keeping clean environment. We have ended up creating much better and cleaner living space for ourselves and our family members. Catch up on reading and mental health well-being. As the lockdown has confined us to our homes, a silver lining is that it has provided us a chance to catch up on our reading. Being most of the time in indoors and solitary, we have ample of time to focus our mind to the printed (or online) book world.

Reading Books
With every connected device a potential portal for anxiety, it may never have felt so necessary to escape into the printed world. Reading our likeable books, trying new books that were once in the ‘to read’ basket have contributed to our better mental health and lessen the anxiety level. Thus, in this COVID pandemic it is imperative to find the positiveness and cling to the hope that this pandemic will end as nothing lasts forever, and good days are with us and will be with us. “Stay Home Stay Safe, Stay Cooperative And Stay Positive”

(Karki is a registered nurse and an active humanitarian worker
and Chandra is a medical doctor)