Random Thoughts - Social Life in a Pandemic

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So here we are, almost heading into the third year of a worldwide pandemic and counting. The past couple of days were marked by the news of the discovery of a new and potentially more nasty COVID-19 variant, named Omicron. That news had triggered panic and resulted in routs on stock markets worldwide from Asia to Europe. 

Countries hastened to protect their citizenry and started to issue travel restrictions on areas where this new virus variant had surfaced. This confirmed that my decision not to jump on the bandwagon of leisure travel from the recent loosening of travel restrictions to be a correct one. Imagine having my trips all booked and paid and now having to deal with the hassle of untangling the administrative mess with multiple parties involving trip re-bookings, postponements and cancellations. Indeed, now is really not the time to embark on leisure travel.

With these uncertainties hovering over my potential travel plans like the proverbial Sword of Damocles, my passport is remaining pristine and safely tucked away in my drawer despite the fact that I have ample budget to travel and also having been fully inoculated with not one and not two but three jabs of the Pfizer-BioNTech (COMIRNATY) vaccine. Yes, I am fully inoculated and had received my third jab (a.k.a. booster dose) just earlier this week.

Even staying in my home city, I have responsibly adhered to all published social distancing rules, spending most of my workweek safely working from home and only venturing out for meetings when absolutely necessary. My occasional forays out of my small apartment have now become micro "travel adventures".  Such is the reality of living in a time of a worldwide pandemic. 

Hopefully, the scientific and medical experts will soon be able to determine that Omicron is not really a whole new ball game in terms of infectivity or virulence. Otherwise, our days of working from home and online shoppings will continue into the year 2022 and possibly beyond.

I yearn to travel the world again. But I will only do so responsibly for the sake of the health of others and my own.

Photo of myself in West Malaysia in 2018, Cameron Highlands, Pahang, Malaysia (2018)


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