I am a military spouse and have lived in Kashmir for many years.
We shifted to Kashmir when it was going through one of its roughest phases – The death of Burhaan Wani, which created a furore in the state.
We shifted there just a couple of weeks post Burhaan Wani’s death and were locked inside our houses in the cantonment. My husband would go off on duty and I would be left alone with no voice or data connectivity.
From cooking, cleaning, looking after our three dogs, I did everything single-handedly. We didn’t have access to any online shopping or food delivery apps. A van would come once a week and we would stand in queues to buy vegetables and groceries. Even then, against all odds, we made wonderful friends in the community (because all we longed for, was support and everyone displayed impeccable community spirit). We would call our parents whenever we got the network. Even the dogs learnt to pee and poop inside the washroom because of prevailing situations and extreme weather conditions like snowfall in Kashmir.
There were life threatening warnings issued to the base installations which often made the whole area go under lockdown. At times there would be complete lights off and all we could do was pray that we survive. When we had the leverage to go out, we would hear slogans like, ‘Army go back, Indians go back, dogs go back’.
It was the toughest time of my life but I survived. During that time, I was also pregnant. We used to go to the Base Hospital, 15 kilometres away from cantonment, in a military van with bulletproof jacket and headgear for check-ups.
So, in such a scenario, the only thoughts we had were – how to survive if there is an air raid? How to survive if there is bombing on the base? How to survive if there are terrorist attacks inside?
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Why is this important now? Because I am deeply pained seeing people crib about the lockdown, of shortage of groceries, maids not coming etc.
Imagine what if it was not a lockdown due to a virus but an actual war? Would we still like to send our kids downstairs? Would we still go for a walk? Would we still crib if we had limited grocery?
Then why now?
In my situation, I did what was necessary for a basic human instinct – survival. We have the same choice now – to embrace the situation for the safety of ourselves and our families.
In such times, we can teach our children lessons like resilience, art of survival, life skills, patience, gratitude and to count our blessings. Not the art of cribbing and blame games.
Working from home and managing a household is difficult but nothing can be more painful than seeing our loved ones unwell. Staying at home will help us stay away from such experiences.
Like they say – ‘When the going gets Tough, the Tough gets Going’.
Let’s spread positivity and see the greater good of our nation getting accomplished.