The Unforgettable Corona

Topic - The year is 2050 and you’ve been asked to write about the coronavirus pandemic for a museum. What story would you tell?

Thirty years ago, in 2020, I was just a little girl in Sri Lanka, a tiny island country in the Indian Ocean. We were having a lovely time; going to school, shopping on weekends, visiting family and friends and going on holidays. One day, after I had a music class, both my parents came to pick me up. I was very happy as usually only one of them comes. When I got into the car I was surprised to see loads of groceries and I asked them why they bought so many goods. They replied that it was because they had heard rumours that the government was going to lockdown the was discovered from Sri Lanka on that day. At that moment little did I know life was going to be on a roller coaster

We had some idea about the

Sri Lanka. This global pandemic originated in the city of Wuhan in began spreading in every country and caused many people to lose their lives. First, we watched over television many people dying, setting up of huge hospitals and streets of Wuhan becoming deserted due to lockdown people dying each day in Italy. It was the beginning of one of the greatest disasters in world history.

I went to school on Thursday, March patient in Sri Lanka was reported.

I remember that day exactly because it was our class teacher’s birthday.

Our teacher got many telephone calls from parents. It was unusual for them to call during school hours. First, we thought they had all called just to wish her a happy birthday. Later on we learnt that they had telephoned to inform about the rumour on school closure and wanted us to bring all our books home. announcement that schools were

Thereafter, our country was placed shops, supermarkets and restaurants were closed and nobody could go out. We were lucky as we had a lot of food stored in our house. Both my parents were at home. I played Monopoly and Scrabble for hours with my mother and played badminton with my father in our garden.

The government placed new health regulations. Accordingly, everyone began wearing face masks and kept a distance of one metre. Everybody washed and sanitized their hands frequently. In addition, people drank various kinds of indigenous medicines to develop their immunity.

The curfew was lifted temporarily for people to buy food and necessary items. Our gardener came and asked to work but my mother refused because of the that many daily wage earners had lost

Hence, we started donating food and money to needy people we knew, to lighten their burden.

We had virtual school lessons as the schools were closed. It was a good experience for us. We learnt a lot about modern technology by doing online studies. Nevertheless, we missed going to school, playing with our friends and all the clubs, games and sports we used to take part in. Some students who did not have facilities for online studies failed to have a proper education. That was a great disadvantage to the society. Although the number of patients and deaths increased in 2021 and 2022, the numbers gradually decreased in 2023 vaccine. Finally, after a long struggle, in 2025 we were able to eliminate the virus. What a relief that was to the

Now it is the year 2050 and we have eradicated the virus from the world. We are living happily and peacefully. 2025, we were worrying about the

Though it was a challenge to live during the pandemic, we also gained a lot of experience. The main lesson I learnt was nothing is forever

Therefore, whenever I go through

Thejini Gamage (11 years) Visakha Vidyalaya, Colombo 5