Diary of a day during the COVID-19 pandemic

As the whole world, our country as well has been
hit by a virus which was declared a pandemic and
we’re been locked down and are respecting the
rules set by the Ministry of Health in order to fight
this virus. As every other day in the quarantine, we
continue to respect the same measures, hoping to
get back to normality soon.

As for the quarantine, we may describe it as a
usual day, waking up in the morning with a
positive energy by sunrays. As every other day of
quarantine, today too we’re respecting the same
measures, mainly staying home. The only one who
did not stop working is my father, while the others
keep respecting the given time to go out for food
supplies, or there were cases when we did not go
out at all in order to avoid contact with people.
Even if we were to go out, we would wear masks
and medical gloves, making sure to clean our
hands with soap and disinfecting them as often as
we could.

We also had a financial crisis during this difficult
period, as almost every other family. Psychological
pressure was quite high during this period, having
in mind the enormous reporting about the deaths
and new cases with COVID-19 In our country on TV
(news and TV shows), as well as in social media.
These had an impact on many disorders in our life
as sleep disorder due to stress but it passed
gradually and we started getting used to this
situation.

As for myself, I am dealing with a lot of activities
due to impossibility to go at the gym, and at the
same time I am consulting my personal coach on
my daily diet and nutrition plan. I am also using
this time to go out for walks since I like nature a
lot, and sometimes I go jogging as well. I am also
helping with chores, spending time reading,
studying for my exams, and also searching on
internet for my diploma thesis, while sometimes
watching movies or series, but spending more
time on my social media accounts.

This day too was one of the many busy with
online lectures which were made possible by the
university since we’re not able to go and attend
lectures in person.

I helped my mother a lot during this pandemic,
mostly in the kitchen, and I learnt a lot of things
about the kitchen trying to eat healthy. It
happened to us to be fasting during this period of
time since now it is Ramadan month and we’re
finishing this obligation that was set to us by our
religion, and we’re all waiting for the time of iftar
altogether.

Due to the pandemic we have canceled all the
invitations from our relatives since it is a tradition
inviting people or being invited during Ramadan.
So, we are respecting the measures set by the
Government by avoiding contact with people.

This is how I can describe a day during quarantine,
almost the same routine, waiting and praying to
get back to normality as soon as possible, in order
to resume all the things we had to stop when this
pandemic began.

This article was written by Diana Bushi, a student in the Department of Social Work in UP under the monitoring of professor Vjollca Krasniqi within the cooperation with SIT. This article was written within the project “Men and Boys as Partners in Promoting Gender Equality and the Prevention of Youth Extremism and Violence in the Balkans”, implemented by CARE International Balkans in partnership with SIT and YMCA in Kosovo and supported by Austrian Development Agency, and Oak Foundation.