Anish's Blogs

Today marks the second anniversary of the availability of vaccines for COVID-19! What a tumultuous 3+ year period it was. The first phase of denials, followed by lockdowns, then partial reopenings, and a cautious sense of normalcy, marked the distinct phases of this pandemic. Everything changed after the vaccine was available though. Humanity had finally won the war against this invisible enemy. But it took more than 6 months for the vaccine to be made available to the general public, only doctors and healthcare workers got it in the first phase. After general availability though there was the same chaos which we experienced during early phases of the pandemic where people hoarded stuff, and essentials like disinfectant wipes were not available for months together. There was a beeline of folks wanting to get vaccinated. After about 4 months of patiently waiting, my family finally got the immunity through vaccination. A lot of things have changed during this journey forever. Man...

Day 5 of my mandatory Working From Home (WFH)! My company followed suit of other area companies and mandated a 2-week WFH in the wake of COVID-19. At first, I thought no big deal; after all we are used to WFH in the tech industry, but for 1-2 days, not extended periods. Soon the reality is kicking in. You don’t get to see your colleagues at office and friends and relatives outside. Human beings are social animals and now I feel like we are self imprisoned, well I meant self quarantined! You cannot go to restaurants, theaters, malls, vacation; life appears to be at a standstill. And now the schools have decided to close too! The dark, gloomy, rainy weather is not helping either. If this is the mental state after just 5 days, imagine folks in Italy where the entire country is on lockdown and what about Wuhan where 11 million people are in quarantine for nearly two months! I am sure the initial 2 weeks of self quarantine can easily turn into 2 month long mandate by the autho...