Cross-Cultural Covidness
This is our first collaborative article! Check out these 3 stories from our team, from different parts of the world:
Drive-by Veggies. A mini-story from Sri Lanka
On a family Zoom chat last night, my cousin told us about the food situation in his part of Sri Lanka.
“A curfew has been enforced here,” he explained. “You can’t leave the house at all.”
“How do you get food?” I asked, confused.
“Well, they lifted curfew for a day, and we tried to get what we could then. We’ve been rationing what we have.”
“Rationing?!” I asked, alarmed.
“Yeah. So, when the curfew lifted, Amanda, Chathura and I shared our grocery lists and split up. We went to different stores to try and get as much from the list as we could. They managed to get some stuff, but I was in a line outside a supermarket for two and a half hours that didn’t even move.”
“Are you going okay with your rations?” My sister asked, concerned.
“Yeah, so far, I am.” He replied.
“What do you do when you run out of food?”
“It’s not too bad. There are trucks that drive by every so often. They sell fruit, vegetables, and other essentials.”
“But you can’t pay by card right?”
“Yeah, it’s cash only.”
“How on earth do you get to ATMs if you’re under curfew?”
“Well, now there are mobile ATMs that are on trucks too. So you can withdraw cash from them when they drive by.”
“That’s wild,” was all I could really say in response.“Yeah. I miss the luxuries though, you know? There’s no way you could get a bag of something like pasta right now.”
I thought guiltily about our supermarkets in Sydney, where pasta is now appearing back on the shelves thanks to shopping limits on customers buying dried goods.
I feel grateful for the privilege I’m experiencing here in Australia. Thanks to my family overseas, I can truly understand this. I just wish there was more I could do to help them.
Ava Senaratne (Editor-in-Chief at TCK TOWN)
Getting neighbourhood news from memes. A story from Mumbai, India.
India imposed a sudden and strict 21-day lockdown very early on. The stringent curfew across the country meant that my family and friends who lived there were not allowed to leave their houses unless absolutely necessary. No, they can’t go out for a short walk either.
A lot of backlash and finger pointing followed. There were instances of teenagers getting beaten by the police as they stepped out to make TikTok videos on the streets, or even when they stepped out to buy groceries. When the PM asked the country to light a candle on a certain evening for 9 minutes as a symbol of solidarity, there were crowds who took to the streets with flaming torches, screaming, “go corona go.” Needless to say, it was chaos.
The amount of information that I was receiving from India while I lived in Dublin, was overwhelming and I just wasn’t sure what was true and reliable. Amidst the confusion, I came across a fairly trustworthy source on my instagram feed; a meme page. Yes, a meme page. @Andheriwestshitposting was posting source-checked data on COVID-19 cases in Mumbai every morning and evening. They were live-translating every speech given by the CM of the state and the PM of the country, from Marathi and Hindi into English. More importantly, they translated the fairly confusing and diplomatic speeches in ways that millennials could actually understand!
While major Indian news channels were finger-pointing and not owning up to their mistakes when made, here was a meme page who was collecting and fact-checking their sources (as volunteers!) and were ready to acknowledge their mistakes when something was falsely reported. They put together lists of COVID-19 testing centres in different parts of the city and were regularly sharing details about the CM’s relief fund. This didn’t stop them from posting memes ridiculing the government or the city’s medical infrastructure. They also regularly busted myths that Desi Aunties and Uncles were sharing on Whatsapp. No, Uncle, drinking cow urine is not going to make you immune to the virus! Dog photos, Bollywood memes and movie recommendations were also posted.
Another meme page shared details and how people could continue feeding stray animals safely, without getting into trouble. @tedthestoner even started a ‘1am doggo post’ where he posts a cute photo of a dog every night. These admins are now sharing daily recipes that don’t require fresh ingredients.
Amidst all the people politicising every action taken in response to COVID-19, here are a group of faceless admins bringing people together and continuing to cheer them up through memes! In these times, when we are all glued to our screens that are filled with negativity, it’s uplifting to see such people like this try to make others' lives a little easier. Also, who doesn’t like dark satirical humor mixed with dog videos?
Radhika (Editor at TCK TOWN)
Surviving This Global Shit Show - A Story from the States
I kept hearing about COVID-19 and didn’t completely take it seriously. It seemed to be so far away and I didn’t fully understand the speed of its spread. It was the beginning of March that the fear of it started to sink into my world, my bubble of work, eat, sleep, repeat. Working in a retail store that is mostly supported by eager tourists shopping and bringing up our sales—we were hit hard when the mass shutdown started to happen, but it still didn’t feel like it was something to be worried about, until my roommate, who is diabetic, said that she found out she had been in contact with someone who tested positive. She was able to get a test, I left work and self isolated with her in our apartment for 72 hours while we waited for her results.
The stress and anxiety I felt from her and the fear of knowing that if she tested positive it would not look good for her having a compromised immune system was a lot to take in. This all felt too real and too close to home. She thankfully tested negative, but by this point, March 15th, my company had closed all 3 stores and I was kept on to keep running social media. I stayed inside and continued to self isolate, afraid of catching anything and passing it onto my roommate. On March 29th I was let go from my job and filed for unemployment, along with 6.6 million other Americans that same week.
The anxiety started to consume me and soon I was afraid to leave the house at all, I was panicking about money, and how we were all going to get through this. The idea of the shutdown and “Safer at Home” law lasting longer than a month was too much to think about, although we’re looking at 2+ months of this now.
I’ve been taking things day by day. I’ve learned to allow myself to sleep in, to cook and to take time to read. There is no use in stressing about the future every single day . It’s comforting to me knowing that people all over the world are going through the same exact thing. To talk to my TCK TOWN team and other international friends and have us all understand each other and share our experiences has been unifying.
It’s a crazy and weird world we’re all living in right now, but I have hope that the changes that come from all of this will be good. I have faith that our economy will recover and I will not be unemployed forever. It’s all scary but we are all in the same boat going through the same shit show of dealing with governments, misinformation and stress. We will get through this with grace and kindness towards one another. We have to.
Molly Kaitlin (Writer and Social Media Manager at TCK Town)
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