Rhythym of the Unexpected

2020, March 13. It’s Friday, finally. The last day of the weekdays. Of course, I know that
all of us are very happy and excited when Friday comes because tomorrow is Saturday. But still,
I cannot stop the time and I still need to go to school. Arg! So exhausting. 7:30 am. I am just on
my way to school but I’m tired already, in terms of mentally, I guess. As I entered our school,
ofcourse, I saw many groups of students talking in the hallway.
“My mom told me that this COVID 19 is spreading very fast in our town,” one student said.
“Oh really? They said there are already a lot of people that have died” another student said.
I didn't mean to overheard their conversation. It’s just that their voices are so loud. So, based on
what I have heard on their conversation, I was also somehow scared at some point but yeah, at
that time, articles about COVID19 were already widespread to the citizens and also, of course, it
was always being mentioned in the news whenever we watched television so I’m already pretty
aware of the situation. By the way, we are already wearing masks on this day and having alcohol
somehow feels mandatory already. My mom always told me to “don’t put down your masks,
anak” “always clean your hands, use your alcohol every after you touch something”. These are
some of the reminders of my mom whenever I leave our house which is ofcourse, I am very
thankful. This is where I really feel that the situation of the community or our country as a whole
is getting serious and unfortunately, it is getting worse because of this transmissible virus.
I have already reached the door of our classroom. Aside from the virus that is spreading,
this is also one of the scary things; to study every time. But yeah, I should not feel this way and
at some point, I just felt grateful despite this deadly situation, we are still here living our life and
continuing being a student.
“Seismology is the scientific study of earthquakes and the propagation of elastic waves
through the Earth or through other planet-like bodies….”
While my teacher is discussing something about science, I feel like I’m not on my body,
my brain is somewhere else.
“BRRRING!! BRRRING!! BRRRING!!!” I checked the time. 8:30am. Why is our school
bell ringing this early?
“There will be a talk or they said, it’s a seminar about this virus, students are required to
go to the gym. I think they will give us some reminders and things we need to know” my
classmate said to me after she noticed that I was a bit confused. “Ohh okay”.
6:30pm. I just got home. Ayst! That was a long day. By the way, the seminar or the talk
lasted 3 hrs. I opened our television while I was resting.
“Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte on Thursday ordered a “lockdown” of the entire
metro Manila region from March 15 to April 14 due to the coronavirus pandemic…..”
Hulala! Yey! There’s no classes for 1 month. Hmm… I will use this time to rest and do
everything I want to do without thinking and worrying about my acads. I’m so happy!!. That was
my thinking and how I felt that time after hearing and knowing the news.
Week1 passed by. Week2 passed by. Week 3 passed by. I didn’t expect that the ‘a month’
would turn into ‘a year’ or even ‘years’.
 Personally, during the first month of lockdown, I thought this would be in favor of me
because I am that type of person that always wants to stay inside the house because I am an
indoor person. But during these 4 weeks, a lot of things happened. Many people felt like they
were in a jail because going outside is not allowed. I remember, we all know that during the first
months of lockdown, government officials are very strict when it comes to people that will
violate the protocol, I remember, my neighbor, he sleep on the barangay hall because he went
outside and he forgot his quarantine pass. So, I think that was his punishment. I realized that time
that disobeying protocols is really a big deal.
“Ms. Garcia posted an assignment. Due on Friday…”
I hate it whenever something like this is notified on my cell phone. But at that time,
because of the fact that we are just still in the adjusting stage, the burden or the pressure of
completing those tasks immediately are still not that heavy. I just passed and passed until my ‘to
do’ lists were already cleared.
After I think, two months, we are now in grade 12. Start of another school year.
Obviously, face to face is not possible because there is still COVID19 so this is the start of the
war between my brain and my laziness. Honestly, at first, I thought virtual set-up is much more
okay than the face to face one but as time passes by and online discussions and lectures are being
done, I realized that, that was just a wrong thought.
Aside from the adults or the professionals/workers that need to have a transition from
working onsite to working from home, students like me are also one of the groups that was really
having a hard time or should I say, still having a hard time up until now. But, of course, the thing
that we should be is to be strong and to cope up with the challenges that this pandemic brought to
us. Adding the fact that this COVID19 is already considered as an endemic today.
On a much lighter side, I still remember up until now some of the tiktok trends that
happened in 2020 or even in 2021 because I must admit that I’m also very into tiktok and I
realized that when pandemic happens, since because of the fact that most of the people have
nothing else to do, tiktok serves as our leisure time which is somehow a helpful way also to
relieve stress and anxiety that this pandemic has brought to us. Whatever ages you are, especially
for the youth, tiktok is very in and take note, not just the youth, but also our elders are also into
this app.
In general, I know that maybe some of us have similarities when we talk about, ‘what did
you experience or experiences during the pandemic?’ but still, each of us were able to get a
lesson from this catastrophe that we have experienced and we are currently experiencing. It is
already given that this pandemic leaves us some negative effects. Obviously, one of its most
negative impacts to us is the number of people that have died because of this virus. Also, up until
now, based on the latest news, the number of severe cases are still continuously rising which is
one of the things that we should pray for, for this pandemic to stop already. Moreover, this
pandemic did not just affect us physically. Most of the people were affected by this through their
mental aspects. Based on what I have researched, a large percentage of Filipino people were
experiencing anxiety and depression as lockdown and as this pandemic started which is of
course, many of us will think one of its main causes is the fact that we are worrying what will
happen tomorrow as this pandemic continue, we are worry about our future. Also, another
negative effect of this is that in terms of financial and economically which is also one of the
problems that my family have faced during the pandemic. Some of my siblings lost their jobs
because the company that they’re working for cut down some of their people and my siblings are
some of them. But luckily, we were able to survive this and my brothers were able to get a much
better job, forever grateful to our Almighty God. Since I’ve started the positive side, I just want
to say that although I have already mentioned some of the negative effects that this pandemic
brought to us, we should also appreciate the positive impact, the lessons and the realizations that
this catastrophe had brought.
One of them is having more time with our family. Honestly, our family is that type of
family that although, somehow we have a close relationship, we did not see the faces of each
other in our house often because the schedules of each one is in conflict and it is just seldom that
our schedules matched. So, one of the positive things that this pandemic had brought is it makes
our family has a closer relationship with each other like what I have said, obviously, because
people are not allowed to go outside of their house, we’re just ‘locked’ in our houses. Also,
because of this reason, another positive impact of this pandemic is that we are able to learn
something about ourselves. We were able to discover something that we are good at that we were
not good before. With me, I discovered that I am good with drawing. Though I already noticed
before the pandemic era that I somehow have drawing skills, this pandemic, made me improve
it. I have more time to make some artworks and improve this skill of mine. I know that, this is
not just in my case but to other people as well, I know that during the pandemic, all of us were
able to discover something. So, these are some of the positive impacts of the pandemic to us.
In general, when we hear the word, ‘Pandemic’, “that’s terrifying” “deadly” and a
“catastrophe”. Although, yes, all of us will surely agree with this but I think, maybe for some
people that experienced the worst impact of this pandemic might say that this pandemic is purely
all negative and they make themselves blind with the positive impact with it. We cannot blame
them because this pandemic is different to each of us. Each person had different experiences but
I know that at some point, we have some similarities. This pandemic made us realized
something. One of those is that no one knows the future. Who exepected that we are going to
have this kind of virus that killed many individuals and affected many people’s lives? No one,
right? Unless you are a fortune teller, just kidding. This pandemic wants us to realize the
importance of the quote, “time is gold” because we don’t know what will happen next. The thing
that we can do in the present is to treasure every moment, every moment with our loved ones.
And also, for me, I know that God has a purpose why He let this challenge to happen to us and
maybe, He wants us to reflect something about our lives and teach us lessons that makes us
improve as a human. Every situation we are in has its positive and negative, it just depends on
you where will you put your focus on.